


Of Bards and Witchers

by hamartiaaaa



Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher (Video Game), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types, Wiedźmin | The Witcher Series - Andrzej Sapkowski
Genre: Dissociation, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Cheating, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Jaskier | Dandelion Has a Past, Jaskier | Dandelion Whump, Jaskier | Dandelion-centric, Minor Character Death, Multi, Original Character(s), Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Pre-Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion, Slow Burn, Tags Are Hard
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-06
Updated: 2020-12-02
Packaged: 2021-02-28 17:01:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 56
Words: 70,491
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23040622
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hamartiaaaa/pseuds/hamartiaaaa
Summary: Julian Alfred Pankratz is dead.Jaskier the Bard gives bits of his heart to anyone and anything he meets. He can't help himself.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia & Jaskier | Dandelion, Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion, Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Yennefer z Vengerbergu | Yennefer of Vengerberg, Jaskier | Dandelion & Original Character(s), Jaskier | Dandelion & Yennefer z Vengerbergu | Yennefer of Vengerberg, Jaskier | Dandelion/Original Character(s), Jaskier | Dandelion/Other(s)
Comments: 320
Kudos: 517
Collections: Good Relationship Etiquette (familial included) - or Good BDSM Etiquette - or Good Relationship and BDSM Etiquette





	1. Beastie and The Bard

**Author's Note:**

> This work is realllll rough. Can't promise it'll stay the same. I have a habit of posting, letting it stew, and then coming back to add more.

He is newly twenty-one when he makes his great escape. Professor Engerran bustles at his side, hands outstretched as if to snatch at the fabric of his sleeve and stop him— "This is _madness_ -!" He says, sucking in a breath. "You've taught one year, made hardly a dent in your career, and yet here you are running off into the woods with practically nothing- _Jules_ , _slow down_!" — but he bounds for the gates with the vigor of a man enchanted by endless possibility.

Eyes alight— yes, he _must_ be enchanted, for he can't begin to describe the all encompassing feeling that's befallen him— he looks to Engerran— _Roderick_ , a good friend and greater colleague— with a grin so wide that he might just burst open at the seams. He is under the spell of some witch that he'd bedded and wronged, most certainly— yet if that is the case, he never wants to be free of it. "I suppose you're right," he says, giddily. "I must be mad, Roderick!"

" _Julian—!_ "

The wayward man relishes in the feeling of the sun against his face, as if he is feeling it for the first time. Roderick cannot hope to keep up with him; he follows as far as the main gates to the city and there the man stumbles to a rest against the archway. Hands on his knees, taking in gasping, heaving breaths and watching after him with wide eyes.

He laughs airily, and closes his eyes as he sprints down the bridge.

* * *

A week later he arrives in Barrowmill and performs for the first time. It goes _horribly_. He learns that people turn to hate when they do not understand something, that to uneducated ears words like happenstance sound like jibberish at best, spellwork at worst— yes, _spellwork!_ They throw rotten fruit— a memorable patron tosses ale onto the front of his coat— and despite it all he is elated. The next night he performs again; this time ditties that have been engrained in his head since his youth, and it is much better received. A patron offers him a coin at the end of the night.

"How goes it, bard? What are we to call you by?"

It spills from his lips easily, despite it being well over a decade since he's last heard it. He plucks the coin and pockets it, grinning from ear to ear.

"Jaskier."

The man snorts, but the bard's grin is infectious.

* * *

Jaskier is twenty-one and a half when a puppy finds him on the very outskirts of a little village called Blackwater; a shepherd's dog who'd come waltzing out of the brush at the sound of his lute. It snuffles at his boots, excited to stumble across a man ( and quite possibly at the prospect of being fed ) and wags its tail fervently. It looks up at him with eyes wide and alive with an innocence only beasts and children could muster, such a deep and profound blue that he might've mistaken them for sapphire crystalline had they not been peering back up at him.

" _Oh_ ," he breathes.

The puppy follows him excitedly— he couldn't bring himself to leave it behind, not when it looked at him like _that_ — bounding and prancing and weaving between his legs as he walks.

"Oi," he says, "settle down!" And the pup looks up at him again. Maybe it's just the panting, but it might as well be fixing him with a grin. He kneels on the path, for once not minding the dust clinging to the knees of his trousers, and scratches just behind its ear.

"At least mind the boots, little beastie." He grins, eyes bright- "Oh... that's quite a good name for you, isn't it?"

They continue on until the first dregs of nightfall. Beastie does his damndest to help him put their camp together— and by help, he means to say the little whoreson kept running off with the sticks for his fire. He manages despite this ( eventually he'd thrown one far enough that when the pup bounded after it he was able to light the rest ). Pleasantly warm, the bard props himself and his instrument against a tree and digs through his satchel. Waterskin. Clothes. Soaps. Scents. Dried meat. Bread. Barely a handful of coins. He's poor, starving, _maybe-quite-possibly-definitely_ lost and his feet are aching, but at least he'll be well dressed and smell nice.

He laughs.

Beastie saunters up beside him and he runs his fingers through the pup's fur. He feeds him bits of dried meat, listens to the rustling of the leaves above him, the faint crackling of a stream in the near distance, and finds his chest feels ready to burst with both excitement and yearning and lack-thereof all at once. Enchanted, indeed. He thinks of silk sheets as he gets himself comfortable against the tree and stuffs bread in his mouth. Thinks of fine wines and dainty hands fluttering about his collar; he sets his things aside and wraps his arms around himself.

_"Julian—!" She cries._

He closes his eyes.

And wakes at the crack of dawn to Beastie slobbering all over his face.

"Gah-!" The bard blanches. He practically wrestles the pup away and into his lap, blinks the tiredness from his eyes as he rubs the slobber from his face and then strokes the dog's back. He wrinkles his nose and tilts his head back with a dull thud against the tree’s trunk. "Absolutely disgusting!" There's no heat to his words, but he feels unclean. Melitele's sake, who knows where that mouth has been and— _Oh_.

" _Gods_ ," he whispers. "It's gorgeous." The fire's gone out, it's chilly, but he's too engrossed in the first dregs of sunlight breaching the horizon to care.

Beastie rolls onto his back, relishes at the tenderness with which Jaskier's lithe and calloused fingers work through the fur on his belly. He's just happy to be doted upon.


	2. The Countess and The Viscount

She is fifteen, he is seventeen, and they are in love. Or will be, anyhow, in two years time. Fleetingly so, as it happens. She will introduce him to his truest love ( Prose, that is. ), and become his first muse. And then she will break his heart— and isn't that song worthy in itself? And then she will break it again. And _again_. And once more, for the final time, when she is twenty-two and he is twenty-four.

Presently Julian wants nothing more than to scratch at the itch his collar brings where it tickles his jaw. If he'd had things his way he'd leave it undone, but, as it happens, such displays are frowned upon at these sorts of events. Here he was meant to sit quietly. Absolutely no fidgeting. Do not speak unless spoken to. Keep your elbows off the table and back straight as a rod. Take calculated bites of your meal, so as not to come across as gluttonous— but eat enough so that you aren't pegged as ungrateful. His fingers twitch in his lap. _Melitele's tits, does it itch_ —

"...lian."

He is grounded as Virginia, his future lover and the soon-to-be Countess de Stael, rests a gentle hand upon his knee. Her face is awfully stony as he peers at her— she herself offers nothing more than a fleeting glance, brown eyes soft and warm and yet despairingly blank, before her eyes are flickering past him— and he finds himself wondering what she would look like, had an authentic smile been tugging at her lips.

" _Julian_."

He very nearly startles. From the head of the table to his right, the Viscount de Lettenhove glowers at him, and at his side Virginia pulls her hand back and reaches up to tuck a lock of auburn hair behind her ear. When she reaches for her drink, it's with a frankly appalling display of equanimity for one so young. He clenches and then unclenches his jaw.

"Yes, Father?"

Julian Alfred Pankratz, soon to be Viscount de Lettenhove, swallows thickly, raises his chin, and turns to meet his father's eye.

* * *

The village of Blackwater does not live up to its name, and thank the Gods for that. In contrast, he finds the water from their well to be the most refreshing he's had in a while. He wipes a droplet from the corner of his mouth with his sleeve and assumes that if Beastie could speak, he would agree— although there is a chance he is from this town, and that he has never had anything but this, and thusly wouldn't agree at all. Things are always sweeter when they are far from home, he finds.

"No."

Jaskier shuffles where he stands in the doorway of the quaint little _Pheasants Inn_. "No?"

The inkeep is a weathered woman. Her hair is blonde and coarse and unkempt, hands near worn to the bone as she scrubs rigorously at the counter, and she gives him a look. The same one a tired mother might give a child who she knows has done wrong. Like she is simply waiting for him to own up to it. He blinks quizzically. She huffs and tosses her rag aside.

"The mutt, you fool bard," she sneers. "It stays outside."

"Ah." _Right_. The pup sits patiently at his heel. The bard purses his lips thoughtfully. The inkeep sighs.

"Play for us," she says, finally. "Your mutt will be well and fine in the stable, I'll have the cook cut up some meat to feed it. You can keep whatever coin you can weed out of the crowd."

Jaskier grins from ear to ear, taps the pup gingerly with the toe of his boot.

"Hear that, Beastie? We've a gig tonight."

* * *

The second time he plays for a tavern, in a town called Glenneth, goes splendidly. Until it doesn't.

His fingers ache in a way that they haven't since he'd first started playing, and his throat is on the verge of soreness, but it is the pleasant feeling warming his stomach at a show gone right that overwhelms him. Cheeks sore from grinning, but he is full and warm and his coin purse is hefty— and so he can't bring himself to stop. He leans against the bar and engages the barmaid in a fleeting conversation.

A man he does not bother facing slides a fresh pint of ale in front of him and he accepts it graciously; it is cold and soothes his throat as it glides down.

"Buttercup, eh?"

Jaskier sputters into the pint and raises his brows; places it back onto the counter before turning. Heat rises to his cheeks as he dabs at his mouth with his sleeve— _Good Gods, if Mother could see me—_

_Oh, he's marvelous._

He's lost within pools of warm mahogany, speckles of fragmented emeralds and shavings of gold. His lips part— the young man is blonde and tall, and his face has strong features of which he might describe as pretty, were such a thing appropriate; he's lean but accentuated with the muscle of which most working men are.

The man inclines his head and smiles. "Name's Dolan."

"Oh-!" the bard says. He thrusts out a hand, tries to will the heat from his cheeks as he realizes he's forgotten to respond. "Jaskier— " He offers— then wrinkles his nose, and settles with a sheepish smile. Frantically he prays to whichever deity that happened to be listening for his mind to align with his mouth. "Ah, well. You knew that already. Er, thank you. For the pint."

Dolan looks amused, smiling pleasantly as he takes Jaskier's hand into his own.

* * *

His back is pressed against the stable wall as their teeth clash— it's desperate and fleeting and Dolan fists his shirt as if he might vanish as soon as he lets go. He feels centered and whole and needed— _wanted_ — and part of him knows he'll be chasing this feeling for the rest of his life.

Jaskier sleeps with him. In a _real_ bed. In a real _house_. And it's good. And he would have done it again come the morning, we're he not being chased abruptly out of the village in the dead of night— _Melitele's sake_ , how was a passing bard to know that the man bedding him was the alderman's _son_?

He hasn't run this hard since Oxenfurt. His lungs are searing, and his legs are burning.

At least he'd gathered most of his belongings.

Quite a shame about the shirt, though. Silk is oh-so-hard to come by outside of the city— and the incessant thudding of the lute against his bare back is sure to leave a bruise come morning.


	3. The Dagger and The Bard

The Pheasants Inn tavern owner— Sara— is so pleased by the reception he's received that she offers him ( and Beastie! ) refuge.

"Never seen the tavern so full," she says. Her face is thoughtful, but Jaskier knows that inwardly she is beaming. "Same as tonight. I'll keep you and yer mutt fed, set you with a room. You keep what you can pull, have run of the mill."

The offer is too good to refuse— he's never been shown such kindness— except perhaps by a certain barmaid in Novigrad some months back— and Jaskier is so relieved and elated and utterly grateful to be indefinitely sheltered that he reaches across the counter and kisses the blessed Saint Sara straight on the mouth.

She backhands him, hits him with her filthy rag and makes him sweep the entire inn twice. He doesn't even get paid for the excessive and unwarranted labor.

She looks at him as he goes over the stairs again— "Sara, _please_ ," he says, leaning precariously against the broom at hand. "This is torture. Cruel and unusual punishment. My hands were made for finer things... Not that your profession isn't fine! We need each other after all, do we not? Can't be a bard without an establishment to play in, but how am I to play at all if my hands are riddled with splinters from this rickety broom? Buy a new one at least— _Nay_ , perish the thought as I’ve spoken it, _I_ will buy the broom. The finest broom you’ve ever laid eyes upon— Take it as a show of my gratitude, splintery free hands—" and she is smiling openly at him. Somehow, he suddenly doesn't mind the work. Or the hand-shaped bruise blossoming across his cheek.

* * *

Outside of a tavern in Novigrad, in the dead of night, Jaskier looses a part of himself to an _entitled piss drunk prick_ parading about with a blade.

The drunk's lips press into his hair, and the edge of the dagger dances across the soft flesh of his throat. " _Fine line between bard and whore, eh?_ " The man laughs. His breath stinks of ale and depravity.

When he's put together enough to stumble inside it is nearing the break of dawn, and the sweeping barmaid takes one look at him and she _knows_. At that his heart breaks— at the understanding, aching sorrow etched into her delicate brow. His heart breaks not for himself, but for those like him; those who have been wronged and those who will be wronged. Those that can do nothing about it but pray it never happens again. She is hardly more than a stranger but in the start of this new day they are something far more; she embraces him, draws him a bath and sweeps a damp rag across his forehead. He will write a song for her.

It is not the first time, nor will it be the last. He leaves Novigrad that morning with his head held aloft as always; if there is a tightness to his throat or a trembling to his fingers, that is only for him and the barmaid to know.

Nothing that happens under the cover of dark or ale or otherwise will define him. He will not let it.

* * *

By his third day in Blackwater, Beastie is making himself acquainted with the townsfolk. They dote on him; he catches patrons stop to scratch behind the pup’s ear. Children slip him strips of meat no doubt smuggled from their mother’s kitchen. Between exploring and bustling about the inn, Jaskier learns some things.

Sara is newly widowed. She talks of her late husband with glistening eyes and a heart threatening to burst— "I knew it was coming," she says. "I could feel it in my bones, Jaskier. He was so sickly that it was almost a mercy when he passed... But I am selfish—" the woman licks her lips— "I would've kept him at my side sufferin' if only so he could see the babe before he up and left."

Sara is _pregnant_. Despite his time in this quaint little village, Jaskier has never seen her from behind the counter— now he lifts himself up to peer over it with barely contained excitement. His eyes widen at the swell of her belly and the bard shouts, with unabashed delight, " _Aha—!_ "

And promptly falls off the counter when he tries to point.

Sara laughs for the first time since the passing of her husband. It is worn from lack of use, but the sound is no less ethereal.

The bard pulls himself to his feet and barely takes a breath before launching into a tangent.

“However could you keep this from me?” He cries. “The babe of a blessed saint— don’t raise your brows in such a manner, you’ll wrinkle that gorgeous face— you carry a _cherub_ , a devine being of excellence, I’ve no doubt. I will craft a lullaby to put all others to shame, I will sing songs of this babe across the Continent and back again—“

It takes him three days, one broom and two sleepless nights to find the words. He plays for her alone that final evening, and Sara of Blackwater weeps.

Beastie watches from her heels, grinning as always, as he departs the next day.

* * *

“ _May you sail fair,_

_to the far fields of fortune._

_With diamonds and pearls_

_at your head and your feet—_

_And may you need never_

_to banish misfortune;_

_And may you find kindness_

_in all that you meet._

_Be the gods ever watchful,_

_to guard you and keep you_

_veiled far from harm’s way._

_May you bring love,_

_and may you bring happiness;_

_May you be loved in return_

_to the end of your days._

_Now fall off to sleep,_

_I mean not to keep you._

_I’ll just sit for a while and sing._

_Be the gods ever watchful,_

_to guard you and keep you_

_veiled far from harm’s way._ ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The lullaby is “Sleepsong,” from Secret Garden with some Jaskier inspired additions for flair and authenticity.


	4. The Professor and The Honorable Pankratz

Julian is eighteen and his knuckles are bleeding as bad his as split lip. Madame Sabia Hughes is nothing like her first name might entail and he can’t stop himself from saying as much despite the answering crack of a cane across his back. He chokes back a sob and releases a throaty laugh instead.

The cane comes down a second time for his _audacity_ , and then a third for _giving the children ideas—_ “We are not children,” he grits, through clenched teeth— and a _fourth—_ a young woman sobs into her hand; and he must admit, the madame is particularly insistent on getting her points across tonight. He must look a mess. She must look _wild—_ because, “ _Maybe then you will learn to keep your mouth shut, Honorable Pankratz_.”

Belatedly he notices that tears have begun to roll down his cheeks of their own accord. Frankly it is embarrassing to be crying at this age- he is a man, but he will never be a free one. He has known that his whole life. There is no point in crying.

Soon he will overtake his father as his sole heir. He will become Viscount de Lettenhove and he will marry diplomatically. He will procure wealth and produce a son to endure the same tribulations as himself, and then _he_ will become Viscount de Lettenhove. The cycle will never die.

The quiet of the classroom is _stifling,_ so he gathers his breath to speak.

“It’s quite alright, Madame Hughes,” he rasps, ever cordial. The tip of his tongue runs across his bloodied lip and he tilts his face to the ceiling. One day his mouth will get him into trouble and it will be the death of him. “One day you will be able to admit you were wrong without _lashing out like a_ _child_.”

The cane comes down a _fifth_ time because he _never learns._

Later, when he is bandaged and laying on his stomach in the infirmary so as not to aggravate the wounds on his back, a young woman sits at his bedside and asks, “ _Why?_ ” He grins— it opens the split in his lip again.

“ _Why not?_ ” He goads, in turn. “She is no better than the rest of us. She makes mistakes, too.”

_Again. Again. Again._

She shakes her head, but he has ignited something in her eyes. “You must be mad.”

* * *

_  
_Six days after his twenty-second birthday Virginia, Countess de Stael, leaves him ( _Again._ ).

“I am in _love,_ ” she says, as she gathers his hands into hers. “What we had was beautiful, Julian, but it was deluded— Oh, _Julian_ , my darling, no— I think back on our times together with nothing but utmost fondness... But I have pledged unto him my undying faithfulness. I am _happy._ ” Her eyes are warm and alight with something close to sincerity, but her visage remains passive as always. He knows she is anything but.

In all the years he has known her, he has yet to see a smile turn her lips. Today is no different, even as she speaks of her love.

He leaves Kerack without bidding her farewell, lest he make a fool of himself.

* * *

He suffers a run-in with thugs some months later. It is his second night in the town of Posada, they are three gaudy young men with supposedly nothing better to do than heckle a passing bard. The inkeep yells them off, thrashing about with his oh-so-formidable broom, but not before they get a few good kicks in and scamper off with his coin.

He lets his head thump back into the dirt and sighs.

“Get up, Bard,” the inkeep presses. When Jaskier doesn’t move, he swats him in the head with his broom. Formidable indeed.

Said thugs return the following morning to watch him play and pelt him with food. It sours his mood enough that he becomes crass in his playing— the rest of the patrons don’t take kindly to this, and it lands him little more than incessant jeers and bread in his pants. He’s stated enough with the free food.

And then he spots the man in the back, drinking alone, and thinks _fuck it all. T_ he man looks up— molten gold, wisened by and yet full of life— and Jaskier is overcome with a feeling he hasn’t felt since his last day in Oxenfurt. A Witcher looks back at him, and he is something to behold.

_Enchanted indeed._

It should have been obvious from the get-go, thinking back on it. If he’d been paying attention he’d have noticed the two swords much sooner. He might have noticed from the stark contrast of the man’s relatively youthful face curtained by pure white locks, or the medallion draped from his throat.

Oxenfurt did not have much by way of Witchers. Roderick had called them a dying breed— they were mutated and old and monstrous. He thinks Roderick might have been wrong— well, maybe not about the old part.

The Witcher blinks.

“Well?” The bard says. “Wouldn’t want to keep a man with... bread in his pants waiting— Three words or less.”  
  


“They don’t exist.”

_Melitele’s tits._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sabia— Irish for “Sweet.”


	5. The Devil and The Bard

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bards have layers. Like onions.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wrote this to “As the World Caves In,” by Matt Maltese and it heavily influenced the ending. Listen to it while reading for those enhanced feels.

As it happens, Posada has a devil problem. The Witcher, Geralt of Rivia, The White Wolf, The Butcher of— Well, he’d found out quite quickly that Geralt isn’t fond of that particular moniker—

“Come here.”

“Eh? ... _Oof!_ ”

That’s okay. As Geralt’s barker, he supposes he’ll just have to get rid of it.

In any case, there is a Devil, and the townsfolk have hired Geralt of Rivia to get rid of it. They’re fed up enough by the trouble it’s causing— stealing grain, mostly— that they seem sincere in their offerings of payment. They’ve also made it clear that they do not want it dead. Odd.

It takes some convincing for the Witcher to let him tag along as such— by which he means he’s stumbled after him like a kicked puppy and resolutely ignored any and all glowering or threats in favor of babbling at him curiously without waiting for a response. Quite frankly, the Witcher is a terrible conversationalist. It’s a good thing Jaskier can keep up the conversation well enough for the both of them.

_The silence is stifling._

“So, a devil,” he says, rolling his shoulders contemplatively. The Witcher pays him no mind, intent on staring resolutely ahead. “Will it have horns? Pointed teeth? Fangs, even? What would a devil even want with Posada’s grain? It’s a ghost town filled with whoresons and innkeepers with very scary brooms—“ Aha—! A glance— “Yes, that’s right, I said _brooms._ You thought those twin blades were scary, did you?” He raises his brows. Geralt looks away, but he also doesn’t rip him in half, so he takes it as a win. He might even go so far as take the answering huff as something akin to a laugh. At the very least he has a somewhat captive audience, and that raises his spirits just a bit more.

“In any case,” he says. “If I were a devil I wouldn’t risk it. Those brooms are terrifying— and I’m sure the grain is just as dusty as the earth.”

Jaskier isn’t used to traversing the off roads. His boots are scuffed to hell and they’ve been walking— in Geralt’s case, riding— for what seems like hours in no particular direction. The landscape isn’t much to his taste, either. Most of it is dry dirt and rocks, but he’ll admit easily that from a distance it is quite captivating— spires of stone tilted precariously yet holding their ground. Reading about such landscapes from dusty tomes is nothing like living them and he’s grateful for the opportunity, even if he does feel like he’s as dusty as the books back in Oxenfurt.

Then they come to a clearing. Geralt ties his mare off some ways back and trudges forward; Jaskier follows excitedly— “a _devil!”_

_“_ It isn’t a devil.”

“Well how would _you_ know?”

Geralt’s face is spectacularly stony as he regards him.

Jaskier shrugs. “I just mean to say, you haven’t yet seen what it is.”

“Devils do not exist,” the Witcher says.

“You have not seen a devil,” the bard corrects, “so you do not know if they exist. Maybe they’re recluses.”

“Shut up, bard.”

He does shut up, for about thirty seconds while he watches Geralt survey their surroundings. And then he surges forward— “ _Jaskier—!_ _”_ opens his mouth and gets shot in the head.

_A fifth because he never learns._

* * *

The Devil of Posada was not, in fact, a devil, but he _does_ have spectacular horns, and hooves, and, well, he’s a goat-man! Which Jaskier might have come to appreciate, if not for the gorgeous elven woman threatening to kill him outright for his audaciousness in existing in the same dimension as her. Which, okay, _fair._ He was an educated man. He was from Kerack. He knows enough of his people’s ‘glorious conquests’ to know that they were utterly selfish bastards running a race out of lands that were rightfully theirs for the sake of fortune.

Besides that, he was tied back-to-back to a passed out Witcher, and his head was pounding in a dull but borderline intolerable manner— and she has his _lute!_ There wasn’t much he could do besides kindle her spieling and buy time for his companion to waken. So he resigns himself to that wait, and through that spieling he learns some things.

Her name is Toruviel and she is sharp-tongued and fiery to say the least. She cuts herself off enough with wracking coughs that he knows she is sickly in some manner. They are being held in Dol Blathanna within the Blue Mountains, where Filavandrel and his subjects have been hiding for quite some time now— “But _you_ had to go and _ruin_ it all. Filavandrel will have you _killed_.” It is clear that the elves— or at the very least this one, in particular— would rather be anywhere else.

This is all well and good, but one thing is persistently nagging at him.

Jaskier wets his lips... He shouldn’t, he most definitely shouldn’t... But he has to. It will eat him from the inside out if he doesn’t. The bard shifts to look over his shoulder as best he can. It’s an incredibly awkward and strenuous position that ends up with his arms feeling both numb and as if they’re about to pop out of his shoulders at the same time, and has his chin practically poised on Geralt’s shoulder.

“Good sir,” he says, eyes wide with wonder, as he gazes at the goat-man. “You are _splendid_ — pardon my ignorance, I mean not at all to offend, but what _are_ you?”

The creature, taken aback, opens his mouth.

Toruviel kicks him so hard that he passes out. Again.

* * *

He isn’t out long. Three things tell him this— the ache of his ribs, Toruviel’s face and seemingly unending rant, and the fact that the Witcher _still_ isn’t awake. _For Melitele’s sake. Take your time, why don’t you?_

There is, however, a second elf. Not Filavandrel— this is another woman. She leans against the wall just behind Toruviel and worries at her lip, eyes flickering between Geralt and himself, then sparingly to the woman before her. He inclines his head as their gazes meet and settles against his companion— might as well be somewhat comfortable if the front-most woman insists on spouting drivel his way.

Gods know how long he’s suffered in silence before the Witcher stirs.

“Oh ho ho!” He says, squirming resolutely. “You’re in for it now!”

Geralt grunts.

Toruviel sneers and puts a boot through his lute.

_Again. Again. Again._

Jaskier loathes to admit he loses himself to a cascade of white noise. The devastation wreaks through his chest like nothing he’s ever known— he’s centered his entire being around the splintered mess of wood that tumbles to his side. The first thing he’d bought purely for _himself._ Because no one could expect anything of a noble with a lute— they’d think it decorum before _life-line._ Hobby before _please, please, please, give me something— give me anything— there must be more to it all than this._ His throat tightens. His life burns at a boot and an instrument busted into tinder for the flames.

He doesn’t know when Filavandrel enters, nor how the Witcher negotiates their release. He’s drowning; too caught up in _please, please, please,_ and scrambling over to cradle the wood and snapped strings to his chest. Belatedly he notices Geralt is staring at him strangely, but he brings a snapped key to his lips and swallows thickly.

The Devil of Posada kneels at his side, and it’s a strange feeling to find comfort in a creature who’s just shot and kidnapped you, but his face is _empathetic_ , if you can believe it.

Filavandrel offers him his lute.

The bard stares dumbly at it until the Witcher nudges the white noise away with the toe of his boot, which stirs him to action. He grasps the instrument with shaking hands and, “ _Thank you, thank you, gods, thank you.”_ He must look as torn up as he feels, for Toruviel has the sense to look sorry, even if she doesn’t say as much. Geralt tells him later that it was the Devil— “Torque,” he says, “the Sylvan—“ who’d talked the king into giving his instrument to him. He even tolerates Jaskier’s questions for the most part, even if his answers are curt and very to-the-point, but it’s very much appreciated.

He’s feeling much more himself the closer they get to town; his fingers cascade over the strings, the neck feels as if it was made to rest in his palms and there is a pleasant weight to the whole of it.

“I have quite the song for you, Witcher—“

The key sits like a stone in his pocket.


	6. The Buttercup and The Bard

The Witcher tries to leave without him the morning after his song debuts— which went _fantastically_ , as it happens, and the way Geralt’s face twisted up into something close to disdain as he sang at him from the center of the tavern floor was quite funny. All in all it leaves him dejected but no less determined to follow. In the end he convinces the man to wait— “Else I’ll stumble my way through the woods after you all on my lonesome, how about it? Don’t test me, Witcher!” To which the man bares his teeth, but at the bards incessant insistence he caves— and they depart by midday, once he’s collected his coin from the innkeeper and gathered his things, which, by the man’s face, he determines is much later than he would’ve liked.

  
“What,” Jaskier huffs. The Witcher stares openly at him as he follows beside his mare. “You really thought you’d be rid of me after one run-in with a Devil?”

Geralt regards him with little more than a quirk of his eyebrow before turning to look ahead and says, rather gruffly, “Sylvan.”

“Yes, Witcher.” Jaskier’s lips quirk as he inclines his head. “I was only being clever, I could hardly forget Torque after a night of song practically dedicated to him.”

“Hmm.”

“The lute is nice,” he says.

Well, that’s quite an understatement. He’s positive that he’s never held a finer instrument in his life. Their first night after Dol Blathanna he’d run his fingers over every inch of it— over the lettering engraved in its neck ( Elvish, obviously— he’d studied it back at the academy and was able to speak it at a conversational level but was hard pressed to translate this scripture. It is _Old_ Elvish. The lute was likely older than Filavandrel himself. ) and the runes etched around the edge of its bodice ( He’d have no hope translating those. Geralt, perhaps. Or a witch. ). He was hard pressed to find sleep that night, edging between white noise and resurfacing at the twang of every other hollow note.

“Its tuning is impeccable,” he goes on to say. “A night of playing like that and not a single sour note even towards the end. And the craftsmanship is marvelous— She’s _old_ and she’s been cared for so gingerly and with such devotion that you can hardly tell she wasn’t crafted just yesterday.”

The Witcher is staring again. This time when Jaskier looks back and smiles, he doesn’t turn away.

“Hmm.”

—

“You don’t have a bedroll.”

Jaskier shrugs from the tree he’s sat against, head tilted back toward the canopy. He’s more preoccupied with the instrument in his lap— there’s this riff that’s been stuck in his head for the last hour or so and he’s trying to determine if he’s heard it somewhere or if it’s something he’d come up with on the spot. In all honesty he’s hoping for the latter, but if it’s the former he’d like the lyrics to pop back up with it at the very least.

“No blanket,” the Witcher states.

“There’s a fire,” he says. “Have you heard this tune before, Geralt?”

“Fires die out.”

The bard stills his fingers at the statement. When he turns look, the Witcher is staring from across the flames. That’s something he does quite often— stare, that is. At everything, as if trying to puzzle something out, or memorize each and every detail with his searing gaze. “They do,” he agrees, belatedly, albeit a little confused. “They can also be rekindled. Is everything alright?”

Geralt merely grunts and rises, trudging off toward his mare. Jaskier’s eyes follow, but his thoughts drift back towards the riff nudging persistently at his attention, so he resumes his position and gazes into the fire as he continues where he’d left off.

And is promptly hit in the face as the Witcher throws a rolled up blanket at him— “ _Melitele’s sake, Witcher!_ ”

“Hmm.”

The blanket falls to his side, and as he looks up Geralt is already making his way back to his seat. He finds the riff has left him entirely and feels its loss strangely, acutely, in his chest, so he sets the lute beside him and unrolls the blanket to drape across his lap. It is only then that he realizes the Witcher had been asking after him, and then offered— well, thrown— his blanket by way of concern.

“ _Witchers are unfeeling,” a patron says in passing to his companion. “It’s the mutations. The spellwork and sacrifices. Twists them up inside. They’re as much of a beast as the ones they’re made to kill.”_

The Devil of Posada kneels at his side and mourns with him as he cradles the broken bodice of his most treasured possession. Toruviel looks on remorsefully, shuffling where she stands before him. The White Wolf of Rivia encourages him to accept the Elven king’s gift and worries that he might get cold.

“Thank you,” he says, after a moment.

The Witcher ignores him entirely in favor of closing his eyes where he sits— meditating, presumably.

_Stifling._

Jaskier stares. Then blinks. Then asks, “Will you be alright without it?”

Geralt opens his eyes. He isn’t sure what they’re saying.

—

The Witcher wakes him at the crack of dawn and he decides then and there that he is not and never will be a morning person. They dress and break bread in companionable silence— well, companionable humming on his part— over the dying embers of their fire and he cradles his lute to his chest like a mother might cradle her babe; and they walk— he walks, the Witcher rides— for well over an hour before his brain catches up enough for him to realize Geralt had packed away all their things before bothering to wake him.

“Oi,” he says, with nothing less than utter eloquence.

Geralt blinks down at him.

“Next time wake me so I can help you pack,” the bard says. “Least I can do as your companion is help around a bit.”

“Companion,” the man states, ignoring his request entirely. Jaskier finds that the Witcher states many things, even when he means to phrase them in question, so he nods his head and looks back at the road.

“Yes, companion. That’s what it’s called when you travel with someone you enjoy having around. Companionship.”

“I enjoy you?”

“Hah, Witcher!” He says, settling his lute across his back and kicking a stone ahead of him. “You’ve known me mere days and, dare I say, you _adore_ me. Fret not, it happens to the best of folk. Just so happens I’m the ultimate companion. The whole package.”

“Hmm.”

“Oh-! Look, Witcher!”

The bard diverts off into the brush, pleased to hear the clopping of hooves cease as Geralt slows his steed to a halt. It’s only a moment of rustling through the grasses before he returns with his prize. Geralt is not quite impressed.

“Flowers,” he grunts. He watches quietly as Jaskier ties them into the horse’s mane— she huffs but offers no other protest, to which the Witcher raises a brow— then tucks one behind his own ear.

“Buttercups!” He corrects.

_“Julian—!” She cries._

“Jaskier,” the Witcher states, with a roll of his eyes as he sets his steed back into motion.

Jaskier flashes a grin and follows after.


	7. The Child of the Fae... and The Bard

The summer following his twentieth birthday, Julian begins teaching at Oxenfurt as their youngest professor. His classes are full to the brim— mostly because his students are about the same age as him, and when you think _young professor,_ you think both _eye candy_ and _easy marks;_ which was not necessarily the case. Well, maybe he _was_ an eyeful, but in the end they stayed for the course. Because he was _good_ at his job. Because while he was providing a challenge he would also cater to the individual. Because he gave them room to _grow,_ and because they left being able to do something more than recite ancient prose in their sleep.

Professors did not play favorites— and he _didn’t,_ he marked every student the same. But, well—

“Good morning, Professor Pankratz.”

Julian beams at the greeting, standing up from his desk in such a rush that he _just_ manages not to spill his ink. “Good morning, Alexander!” He extends his hand with a flourish at the familiar face, to which said face looks alarmed, then pointedly away. “Do call me Julian,” he says, wholly unperturbed. “I’m hardly older than you.”

“No.” Alexander says. His face scrunches distastefully, turning to stare at his still outstretched hand, and Julian fears he may have offended him in some way before he shakes his head. “Er, yes... Professor Julian. You are twenty. I am nineteen-and-a-half.”

And with that, he rushes to claim his seat at the front and begins setting out his things. It is methodical work; he sets his parchment and quill _just so_. There is another hour at least before class is due to start. The man pulls out a book and is immediately and thoroughly engrossed.

Julian marks every student the same, but Alexander is undeniably his favorite.

—

“I want to go with you,” Jaskier says, hands poised on his hips.

Geralt grunts, then moves to walk around him into the apothecary, so he follows to the side. The Witcher regards him with narrowed eyes. It is the Witcher’s first contract since they’d begun traveling together— a wraith plaguing the fields of a local farmstead— and Geralt means to have him wait it out by the safety of the farmer’s fireplace.

_“She’s there every night, wailin’,” the man says. “From dusk to dawn, wailing’ somethin’ fierce. Like a dyin’ animal. I can’t take it, and I can’t harvest no grain while afearin’ for my life. I have coin, it ain’t much, but it’s all I could muster.”_

_Geralt inclines his head, face grim, but nods._

“What.” He says, curtly.

Jaskier claps his hands together, then throws them apart exasperatedly and exclaims, “I want to go with you! How am I to write of your exploits if I am not there to witness them?”

The Witcher looks between his hands, frowning, and the bard knows what he’s about to say before he even says it.

“No.”

The Witcher moves again. The bard moves with him. Then the Witcher lifts and deposits him gently to the side, as if he weighs no more than a throwing stone, and enters the apothecary. Jaskier stares after him for all of thirty seconds before huffing and following him inside.

—

Matilda Westcotte, fellow professor and benevolent colleague, sips at her drink in such a way that it turns Julian’s stomach unpleasantly. He distracts himself with a mouthful of his sandwich. Roderick raises his brows.

“How is it?” She asks, suddenly, regarding him with thinly veiled curiosity. “The Fae child. It takes part in your morning class, does is it not, Julian?”

Julian does not hide his confusion well enough, brows knitting together as he swallows. As he opens his mouth to voice his question, Roderick interjects— “The changeling, Jules. The Hedley boy. I might admit I am curious as well.”

He wrinkles his nose in recognition. “Alexander Hedley is no fae. Nor is he an _it,_ or a child.”

“And how do you know?”

“I gave him my name a fortnight ago,” he says, between a mouthful of food. Matilda eyes him distastefully at the act, so he swallows. “He said ‘No,’ and scampered off.”

“Rather rude of him,” she says. Roderick nods.

“What? Not at all. Neither of you were even there.” He feels very suddenly like he’s sitting with children, instead of with a woman old enough to be his mother and a man the same age as his uncle. “What right do you have to make assumptions of a man you have never met based solely on my word? He was very polite.”

Suddenly Matilda is very focused on her lunch.

It is not the last time he hears references to “The Fae child,” and he always makes sure to correct them with the man’s name.

Alexander cannot meet his eye, and is very insistent on not being touched. When the lecture hall’s chattering reaches a certain threshold he covers his ears, squeezes his eyes shut and begins to rock in his seat, and Julian knows to quiet them down. Some mornings he will talk Julian’s ear off about his newest book— or a rock he’d found, or a cat he’d seen weaving between the academy buildings— while making animated gestures such as shaking out his wrist or hopping about.

Julian is more than happy to listen. Alexander is as much of a man as the rest of them, everyone has their quirks.

—

He sees Alexander in Geralt, sometimes. In the way he wrinkles his nose as they enter a particularly rowdy inn, or the methodical way he strips his armor or fiddles with his blade. In the way he has troubles voicing himself but if you pay close enough attention to his actions it’s suddenly quite obvious what he means to say. And also the resoluteness with which he speaks. Everything is certain. Everything is curt and literal. Everything is—

“No.”

Jaskier opens his mouth—

“No.”

— and snaps it shut again with a huff.

“You are like a child,” the Witcher says, eyes fixed at him over the lip of his tankard. The bard bristles in offense.

“I am not,” he says. “You’re just a stubborn brute—“ the Witcher raises a brow— “I want to write, Geralt! I need inspiration from my muse— that’s you— yes, _you_! I need more than just watching you brood stop your mare. You need to go _swish swish_ with your swords, so that I might clap and say ‘ _Hoorah-!_ ’ when you kill the thing, and then turn it into a magnificent ballad to fatten our purses and bring us fame.”

Geralt drops his drowned drink to the table and motions the barmaid to fill it anew. “There will be no killing,” he says. Then, “Hopefully.”

Jaskier blinks. “Why not?”

Geralt turns his gaze unto those milling about the tavern.

“Alright,” the bard says, propping his head up by his hand. “What do we do, then?”

_“I_ find who killed her,” he hums. “Find the body. Get rid of the wraith.”

“If there’s no killing to be done, why can I not help?”

The Witcher gives him a once over.

“Because,” he says, “you’ll fuck it up. And then she will kill you, and I will have to kill her.”

He makes a face, he is certain, because the Witcher rolls his eyes. “Fine then.” He’ll play and mingle with the townsfolk while Geralt does... whatever he’s planning to do with the corpse. As it happens, his fingers were itching to pick up his lute again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Children of the Fae,” are likely the ye old interpretation of autistic individuals. Autism in folklore really resonates with me. Idk how to explain it, but I needed the rep in here.


	8. The Bath and The Bard

Julian is poised with his chin propped in the palm of his hand as he leans against his desk. It is well before dawn and yet he finds himself awake and staring past the lecture hall seats, engrossed in the peeling wallpaper in the back. Peeling paper and delicately painted flowers wilting. Given enough time perhaps their petals will flutter to the ground. The silence of this lecture hall is _stifling._ He wonders if he can move— wonders if a breeze might send him careening with the wilted plantlife— yet he does not. Is he even breathing? He blinks, and yet he feels as though he isn't even seeing anymore. Perhaps time has frozen him in place. Maybe he was never there to begin with.

"... sor?"

He thinks belatedly that something is moving- and thinks for a moment that maybe it is himself- but no, it can't be, not really. He blinks again and yet still he does not see. His mind is stuffed so full of wilted flowers that he they must be real and spilling from his mouth.

"... sor Julian?"

_"Julian," she barks. Her brows are creased and a frown dangles from her lips. It is never said sweetly. It is never something said fond or spoken endearingly. Julian can only do wrong, it is all he knows how to do. He wishes he could be good. When she strikes him he does not cry. He does not know what he has done, but it must have been bad for his mother to fret so._

"Professor Julian?"

He jolts; flinching back into his seat with enough force that his tea falls to the floor and shatters. He stares at it and then stares some more and takes a shuddering breath. Wetness dampens his cheeks; he touches it but can make no sense of it, and so he kneels instead to collect the shards. His hands feel as if they belong to someone else entirely. They shake.

Hands not of his own cup his face, and then he is pulled forward and pressed into the firmess of another. It is warm and real and unravels something in his chest that he didn't know he harbored. Julian is twenty and it should be embarrassing to be crying now, of all times, when he has finally made something of himself, but somehow it isn't. His body has forgone him and mourns something that he cannot name. He sobs freely and cannot bring himself to care at the heart of it.

—

It is midday when the Witcher stumbles into the tavern. He is covered in a fine sheen of what looks to be ash- it looks like he had tried to rub it from his face, but as his hands were coated in it as well there was very little he could've done. His passive expression does not change as his eyes meet Jaskier's from where he plays at the center of the room, but something in them gives him pause.

The Witcher looks away and mumbles something to the innkeeper who huffs rather disgustedly, then stalks off to his room.

Jaskier debates all of thirty seconds, eyes flitting between patrons and starewell before he clambers to his feet follows; the patrons begin muttering as he does, flinging bits of food as he passes.

" _Bard!_ "

"Yes, yes, _Bard_ ," he calls back, agreeably. "I'll be back shortly."

He stands in front of the Witcher’s door, and he must have heard him coming because the door swings open before he can bring his fist to rap against the wood. Geralt blinks down at him, displeasure carved into his features— whether at the sight of him or at the discomfort of whatever it is coating his skin the bard cannot tell. Jaskier squeezes past into the room before the Witcher gathers his wits enough to ask him to leave.

“Hmm.”

“Yes, hmm,” Jaskier echoes. He perches himself on the edge of the man’s bed as the door clings shut and lifts his lute from his bodice. “Go on, then, what happened?”

“She is gone.”

Geralt crosses the space in only a few strides, methodically stripping his armor and letting the pieces fall haphazardly as he does so. He sighs and props his lute beside the bed before getting up to collect them— he’ll have them washed later.

After a beat— he’s heading for the bath, he realizes— Jaskier speaks again. “That much is obvious,” he says. “I meant with you. Are you alright?”

The Witcher turns, bare chested— scars litter his skin on all sides like constellations; it is not the first time he has seen them but he can’t help himself from wondering where they came from— and meets his gaze with a striking resemblance to the look he gave across the fire on their first night together.

—

The person embracing him hums into his hair— a soft and simple melody that still manages to send a shiver down his spine. It stops as he finally gathers his breath.

“Professor Julian?”

Julian blinks. His hands are fisted into the fabric of someone’s clothes. He blinks again, releasing them to palm at his eyes as the voice finally registers.

“Pardon the sight of me,” he mumbles as he lifts his face. Alexander turns his head a bit as their eyes meet. He says nothing, merely flickers his gaze about the empty room. “I regret to admit that I am unsure what came over me.”

“You are not happy,” Alexander says. It is not a question.

Julian parts his lips—

“You are a good teacher.” 

— and shuts them again.

“Many things can be good. Mathematics are good, but they do not make me happy so I do not do them... Most people do not like bugs, but they are good too. They make me happy. I study them, and it’s okay that no one understands. Did you know that _Porphyrophora polonica_ gives us red dye? And—”

—

He’d turned, of course, to give the man modesty as he enters the tub, but after some minutes of very little scrubbing his skin begins to crawl. He’s certain Geralt is content with just scrubbing at his skin with a wet rag and leaving it be but Jaskier would never be able to live with himself if he allowed it to happen.

“Daft Witchers,” he mutters as he makes his way over. “There is _soap,_ Geralt, for Melitele’s sake, _use it.”_

And the Witcher looks up at him with widened eyes, though the expression is schooled over rather quickly. Jaskier pulls a seat to the edge of the tub and rolls up his sleeves— he pays his searching gaze no mind as he pulls the rag out of Geralt’s hand and lathers it with soap before pushing it back into his grasp.

“No need to look at me like that,” the bard mumbles. He motions with his hand for the man to move. “Turn your back to me so I can get at your hair.”

The Witcher doesn’t move. “What?”

Jaskier blinks. “Your hair. It needs washing.”

The burning embers of the Witcher’s irises flit over his face— his throat, his hands, back again to his face— ... _oh._ He lowers himself so that he’s leaning on his knees.

“I mean only to offer my help in washing your hair. Surely,” he says, “if I tried anything, which I have no intention of doing— because what is a bard if his muse is dead? Surely you could snap me in half without much trouble.”

Geralt huffs, eyes still raking across his features, but he must see _something_ because he turns.

Jaskier is slow in his movements as he goes about them. “I’m going to wet your hair, alright?”

“Hmm.”

“I’m going to rub this into your hair— I apologize in advance if I get caught on any tangles.”

“Hmm.”

“Good _gods,_ Geralt, do you own a brush?”

“No.”

“No!?”


	9. The Baroness and The Bard

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> rest assured there will steadily be more geralt.

They’re sharing a room in a nice Novigrad inn— sharing because it’s cheaper, and they’re poor as it is. The days are growing colder and that means not only are there less contracts for the Witcher but folk are fickle in anticipation of the cold weather ( and therefore _more_ annoyed by the very sight of the bard prancing about with his unending grin. ). Not that he’s complaining, it’s a nice inn and nice inns mean nice baths and nice beds and good food— in any case, they are sharing a room, and it is there that he presents Geralt with his prize.

“A comb,” the Witcher deadpans.

Jaskier waves it about, partly for dramatic effect but partly because Geralt has a habit of following things with his eyes and he finds it amusing. Like he’s tracking its movements and getting ready to pounce— not unlike a cat chasing a feather in the wind.

“A comb!” He exclaims, then sets his palms on the man’s chest and pushes him back— or _thinks_ he’s pushing, at least; Geralt might just be generous ( or curious ) enough to _allow_ the movement— so that he’s seated on the edge of their bed. “I bartered for it in the market. We’re going to brush your hair.”

“You stole it.”

“What an utterly outlandish accusation,” he huffs, feigning great offense. “I _found_ it.”

Geralt searches his face. “What happened to bartered?” He asks.

“Quiet,” Jaskier mutters, jutting a lip petulantly. “You misheard me, it isn’t like you ever give me your full attention anyhow.”

The Witcher stares. They both know Geralt mishears nothing.

Alright, maybe he _had_ stolen it— but not from a market stall. It just so happens that his latest suitor had it lying on the nightstand beside them; delicate, finely crafted, and very obviously unused. They were generous enough in their spending to have a _decorative comb_ — and it shouldn’t have been but his mind had wandered, as it often did, and, well _Geralt_ — “Stop staring at me like that.” It just seemed a waste to let it sit there, is all.  
  


Jaskier sniffs and decides, instead of suffering the man’s gaze, to move, so he clambers onto the bed and kneels behind him.

This wasn’t so different from the routine they had fallen into in their months of traveling together. Geralt no longer tensed— or at the very least it didn’t last as long— when he settled behind him, nor does he comment when Jaskier gathers his hair. He’d washed it himself plenty of times by now, but this was their first time to have a luxury such as a _comb_. Jaskier himself didn’t own one, his hair was short enough that it didn’t tangle as such. Geralt, on the other hand, has been outright neglecting himself.

“You are thinking loudly.” He says— or, literally, _I’m bored, hurry up._

Jaskier tuts and begins to untangle what he can with his fingers, then hums under his breath as he takes the comb to the Witcher’s snowy locks.

_Go to sleep, go to sleep,_

_Close your azure eyes;_

_If you close those azure eyes,_

_You’ll cuddle up to me._

_Go to sleep, go to sleep,_

_You little falcon;_

_When you grow_

_We’ll go to the field._

He drags the comb slowly through the Witcher’s locks. The man is relaxed as he sits perched on the edge of the bed; likely he’s begun to meditate as Jaskier works through the knots. If he listens just enough he can hear the soft rumbling being worked from Geralt’s chest, not unlike a feline’s contented purr.

—

Julian’s favorite part of the Lettenhove estate is the tree outside his bedroom window— or, more specifically, the warbler that has taken up home in it. It wakes him at the first dregs of dawn, and while he cannot stand being up at such an hour normally, he finds himself reluctant to miss its performance. He always somehow finds himself leaving the warmth of his bed and padding barefoot across the cool wooden plains of his floors to lean against the windowsill.

Sometimes he pulls up the chair from his desk and falls back asleep there.

Usually he just listens.

Often he wonders what it would be like to step from his sill and leave this place behind, whether that means soaring or otherwise.

A knock sounds at his door. His shoulders tense almost painfully. The warbler quiets.

“Honorable Julian Pankratz,” comes a voice. “The Viscount de Lettenhove requests your presence at breakfast this morning.”

“Yes,” he sighs. “I will be there shortly.”

—

The first time they part ways is not because Geralt has finally shaken him off, but because Jaskier has been asked to perform at a courtly affair and as it happens Geralt _detests_ them— the Witcher heads east instead, at the promise of work. And Jaskier had anticipated the disappointed ache of losing his muse, of course, but he didn’t expect to feel so _empty._ So _lonely_. At least in the silence at Geralt’s side he could always look up and find someone looking back— even if he did look away every time their gazes met.

Now he stood in front of the mirror in his appointed quarters, fidgeting with his collar and hands twitching with that familiar urge to itch. _No fidgeting, keep your back straight as a rod—_ tonight he was here to _perform_ , not _partake,_ but it never hurt to flaunt his nobility just a bit. It garnered him a scrap of respect at the very least, and he _was_ requested by name.

_Baroness de Eldeham requests kindly the presence of Honorable Julian Alfred Pankratz, bard Jaskier, by way of performance—_

His face had soured at the very sight, but he managed to school his expression with a bit of effort at Geralt’s questioning gaze. He folds the letter closed and tucks it into his doublet. “I’ve been invited to perform for the baroness,” he says, working a smile to his lips. “A fine opportunity— she stands offering quarters and payment, of course—“

“You don’t want to go.”

Jaskier shakes his head fervently, “Quite the contrary, my friend! I wouldn’t miss this for the world— she’s hardly a _notable_ baroness but word will spread nonetheless and once it does—“

Geralt cuts him off with a “Hmm,” and shoves a chunk of bread in his mouth. Jaskier sniffs but says nothing more. His food remains barely touched that night.

—

A real bath is something Jaskier will never take for granted, a _nice_ bath in a _large_ tub is cause for reverence. No matter how many streams they stop to bathe in, he can never rid himself of the feeling of being _dirty._ An occupational hazard— one that was bearable, but he’d complain about nonetheless and— _what in Melitele’s tits—_

_“Pardon me,_ or pardon _you,_ rather, what in the _world_ are you doing—?”

Geralt stands there with a resolutely unimpressed look, bare of all but his towel, like, _What does it look like, Bard—?_ and promptly _drops the thing_ before _joining him._ Jaskier blinks owlishly, tucking himself farther back, and then turns his face away entirely— he’d seen the man bare before, _obviously_ , that comes with _bathing in streams,_ but—

“Your thinking is just as annoying as your speaking,” Geralt grunts. “Which is saying something considering I cannot hear it—” and at the very least he is decent ( submerged, rather, and thank _fuck_ this tub is unreasonably large ) when Jaskier’s head snaps toward him, because that is probably the longest sentence Geralt has ever said to him in one go, and it was _insulting._

“You are an _unreasonably rude brute_.”

The Witcher rolls his eyes. “This water is cold.”

Jaskier blinks. “The water is _hot_ , you just like it _boiling— don’t you dare with the Igni, Geralt, you will cook me alive—“_

_“_ I prefer your thinking to your grating voice.”

“ _Insufferable Witcher—!”_

Geralt silences him with a splash of water to his face— or tries to silence him, he assumes. In reality he just sputters indignantly.


	10. The Princess and The Bard

If Jaskier had any sense he'd have packed more— in fact, he's begun to make a mental list titled ' _Things Geralt Will Call Me Stupid For Forgetting And/Or Not Purchasing,'_ such as but not limited to: a bedroll ( again ), new boots ( as presently his were at the brink of being walked to death ), and a _cloak, gods damn him._ But really, how was he to anticipate a _downpour_ in the middle of a dry spell?

In any case he's soaked and freezing, but so focused on keeping Filivandrel's lute from becoming waterclogged that he doesn't notice Roach's slowing.

He thinks back to the day a storm not unlike this one drowned all the flowers in the garden outside his bedroom window in Kerack. Wonders if the same fate might befall him, however unlikely.

"Bard."

He stumbles to a hault at the steed's head and turns to look up at her rider, sopping wet and, as Geralt might attest, blessedly silent for once. The Witcher stares at him so intently that it makes him shuffle on his feet. He blinks and droplets spill down his cheeks to join the ones falling there resolutely; shifts so as to tuck his lute case more thoroughly between him and his undone doublet.

"Yes?" He asks.

Jaskier wouldn't deem such an answer so profound, at least not under these circumstances, but Geralt is so moved by it he dismounts and works undone the ties of his cloak. When it settles weightily on his shoulders and the Witcher pulls the hood up to shield him further from the elements he thinks he might be dreaming. It's warm, and even if it doesn't smell that great ( although there is something to it that is distinctly Geralt, which he finds he doesn't mind ) he is decidedly grateful because he hadn't even realised he was shivering. It isn't long before the man himself is soaked through, though he only mumbles something about Roach and a cave. He isn't really listening— although he's swathed in warmth it brings attention to other discomforts. That being said, he's bone tired and miserable. The cloak is warm but heavy and does little to settle the chill already worked into his bones due to his soaking garments— and he had been clutching his lute with such fervor that he finds his arms ache as he loosens his hold.

"Jaskier," the Witcher says. His brows are creased— he looks _worried._

It loosens his tongue enough to speak. "I'm quite alright, my friend. Tired, is all. And soaked. Cold. Actually, I lied— I am most definitely miserable. Not that I am ungrateful for— Will you be alright, by the way? You don't _have—"_

And then Geralt's hands are under the cloak and grasping his waist firmly— fingers slip just beneath the hem of his shirt and, oh, they're quite warm, actually. And rather large. Jaskier finds himself wondering how he hadn't noticed these things before and why he was noticing them now. He has not even a moment to consider what is happening or what to say before he's being lifted— not for the first time— and plopped carefully onto Roach's saddle. He blinks owlishly.

"Do I even weigh anything to you?" He blurts, as he hugs his lute to his chest.

Geralt rolls his eyes and takes the reins, guiding his steed forward through the muddy earth. "No."

Jaskier licks his lips, then sighs heavily. He isn't sure where Geralt intends to take them but he's certain that if they don't find somewhere soon he's going to pass out in this very saddle— which is another thing entirely! It was made quite clear that this was not something which he was allowed to do. Roach was loyal to a fault, and _picky,_ and Geralt was, for lack of a better term, _possessive._

He shifts a little. "Geralt, will she buck me? Is this okay? I don't want her to think she has to carry me, I'd be fine to walk on my own—"

The Witcher peers up at him— and that's weird to say, really. Just as weird as peering _down._ The crease in his brow has lessened, at least.

_"_ Quiet, Jaskier."

For once, he obliges.

The feeling of Geralt's hands on his waist linger, and the sent of him envelops him wholly, and he is tired but altogether content. He wonders belatedly, if it had not been raining, if their scents would intermingle in the air and what his companion would think of it. And then Geralt's lips quirk to one side, ever so slightly. _Oh,_ he thinks. _He's pretty._

_Fuck._

_—_

Jaskier was right about the baroness— she wasn't worth much on her own but nobility had connections and he was finally able to play something _substantial_ to get them _talking_. Granted, it was still about Geralt.

It must have gone over well, because somehow he finds himself, only two months later, escorted into Cintra to perform privately for their princess's twelfth birthday.

He'd heard stories.

A child of chaos rattling stone walls with her voice when tempted. A child of great power.

Pavetta is a child, but she is more than just _stories._ Chaos leaves a metallic taste on his tongue— he's familiar with it, he'd met sorceresses and sorcerers alike. Pavetta is _dripping in it._

She steps down from her seat and pads over to him. He kneels. Somewhere in the back Queen Calanthe snorts, but Pavetta is giggling at the gesture. His heart swells.

"What is your name, Sir Bard?" She asks.

He inclines his head. "Jaskier, Your Highness," he says, "or, rather—"

Her eyes are as wide as her grin as she exclaims, "Buttercup the Bard!" and erupts into a fit of giggles. Jaskier can't help himself from beaming.

Princess Pavetta is simply a child. The chaos is over-shadowed by the pink of her cheeks and her poise, the laughter that bubbles from her throat and the bright eyes and the pale hair that fall in waves down her shoulders.

He must do well. Calanthe expects him to perform again the following summer.

—

"Geralt, for crying out loud, there's no need for _manhandling— Yes,_ I am quite sure I can walk on my own—"

And he _does,_ pushing Geralt's arm from his shoulder as he stumbles his way through the cave's threshold. Even if it is draining, even if his legs feel ready to give out under the weight of his soaked garments. The chill has crept under his borrowed cloak— at least he isn't shivering. Yet.

Geralt huffs as he practically collapses into a sitting position on the man's bedroll and fumbles with the cloak's clasp. The Witcher busies himself putting together a fire-- which thankfully doesn't take long.

Jaskier is eccentric, but not stupid. From there it's stripping from clothes that stick dreadfully to his skin and warming before he can catch a cold or worse, if he hadn't already. He sighs at the feel of dried clothes and a warm fire and falls back.

Geralt drapes the cloak back over him.

"Geralt," he says, sprawling out.

"Hmm."

"You're doting on me like a mother hen."

"Hmm."

He sits up so that he might catch the man's gaze and readjusts the cloak over his shoulders. "Thank you, Geralt. Are you sure you're alright?"

The Witcher peers back at him with that familiar look, mutters something about the fire, and it's then that understanding befalls him.

"Oh," he says. Geralt prods at the flames with a steady hand.

The Witcher has never had someone to ask after him.


	11. Cynthia and The Bard

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> gonna be honest i had like way more trouble than i thought i would have writing this one and i kinda don't like it so i apologize. also i have a sun burn rip my body.

Just over half a year passes before their paths cross again— in Oxenfurt, of all places. On _accident._

Jaskier lowers his head into his hand as Matilda and Roderick take turns sipping their drinks and droning on— "Julian, honestly," the woman says, "think of the academy."

"You're a phenomenal professor—"

"I can't imagine the backroads to nowhere might provide any sort of intelligent conversation—"

— and lifts it just in time to see the White Wolf of Rivia enter the tavern just down the road.

The table lurches dangerously in his haste to stand— " _Julian, by gods—!"_ and he winces as he pulls away, but he's sick of the lecturing and the belittling masquerading as intelligent conversation and _gods_ _damn him_ if he passes up this chance. He's booking it down the cobblestone path before Matilda can snap about his indecency or Roderick can lift himself from his seat.

A hand fists into the sleeve of his shirt just as he passes through the threshold. It takes a moment to wrestle his focus, but once his gaze settles on their face the familiarity strikes him hard in the stomach. A smile settles pleasantly on her lips.

"Julian?" She questions.

He feels sick.

_A fifth because he never listens._

He opens his mouth to speak, but his throat feels dry all of a sudden. "Why are you here?"

_She peers at him from his bedside. "Why?"_

_"_ I caught word of your—"

"Jaskier."

His head snaps to the side.

"Geralt—"

Its been just over half a year but he's changed hardly at all. His hair has lengthened, perhaps, and his scruff is unkempt, but his eyes are still alive and— he must have sensed something, to approach him first. He looks as if he'd rather be anywhere else.

"A Witcher in Oxenfurt?"

He turns to face her again. Her nose scrunches in a familiar manner, one which he used to find cute until he _realized_. Disgust etches its way into her brow.

_"Julian—!" She cries._

"Hmm."

_—_

_"_ Julian, don't be silly," she breathes.

Cynthia brushes across his bottom lip with her thumb, lips quirked as she peers at him. He leans toward her, hands running up her waist as she straddles him in the parlor seat— she giggles, something akin to windchimes in spring and birdsong, and turns her face away.

"Will you play something for me tonight?" She asks.

"Of course." He'd play until he bled for her.

"Silly," she echoes. "Silly Julian."

He will.

—

"You never _listen,_ Julian!"

Her palm meets the flesh of his cheek, and then she is shoving and he is careening and then sprawled onto her sad excuse for a couch— " _Listen to me!"_ He blinks up at her, fisting at the cushions.

_"You are not happy," Alexander says. It isn't a question._

Her hands find their way into his hair but they are scornful; she tugs him forward sharply and he reaches out and her hand comes down to strike him again— he doesn't know what he's done this time, can't bring himself to care. He takes one wrist into his hand and then the other and she is _feral._ Her biting remarks are shrill in his ear and the silence is stifling but this is all too loud.

He blinks up at her.

" _Julian—!_ " She cries.

And then he is kneeling outside the temple school with blood on his hands— his own, he later learns, from the blood flowing from his nose. His heart beats so fiercely in his chest that he fears he might wake the entire village. A breath shudders out of him; he hasn't a clue how he got here.

\--

Geralt's presence, as it turns out, is enough to dissuade Cynthia from engaging in any sort of conversation— and while on one hand the prejudices toward his companion disquiet him, tonight he is grateful for it. When it is apparent that he has no intention of leaving the man, she mumbles something about how nice it was to see him and turns away.

He lets out a breath he didn't know he was holding, it hisses past his teeth of its own accord.

"Julian," the Witcher hums.

"No." The sharpness of his tone startles himself. Geralt merely inclines his head.

"Hmm," he says. Then, "Jaskier."

And that is that, it seems. Geralt questions none of it, either doesn't care or is waiting on him to elaborate; only returns to his table and puts aside his things make room.

A smile works its way onto his lips.

Who is Jaskier to turn down such an invitation?


	12. The Bard and His Lute

As it happens, Jaskier was not particularly lucky— this is accentuated by his fifth sneeze in the last hour and his dreadfully clogged sinuses. He shivers even as he pulls Geralt's cloak tighter around his shoulders.

"I'm dying," he concludes, solemnly.

Geralt blinks at him from across the fire, then shifts back against the wall and closes his eyes.

"How am I to sing like this?" He questions. "My career is ruined before it has even truly begun— the greatest bard of our time thwarted by a plague." He falls against the bedroll with a huff and curls into the cloak fully.

"You don't have a plague," sighs the Witcher.

"I am most definitely dying," he says, woefully. The fabric muffles him but they both know Geralt can hear him perfectly well.

"No."

"My demise rounds the corner! I will die in this cold, damp dingy cave. What if Valdo Marx takes my place? Geralt, as my dying wish, I beg of you, be rid of Val—"

"Jaskier."

The bard lowers the cloak enough to peek out from beneath it and startles. He doesn't know when or how, but at some point Geralt had made his way beside him. The man hums and puts a palm to his cheek— surprisingly cool against his skin despite his shivering— then his forehead.

"No plague," he says. "A little feverish."

"A little feverish?" The bard echoes. "My head has been stuffed full of cotton, I am freezing yet disgustingly damp with sickly sweat—"

"Hmm," the Witcher says, comfortingly, then he reaches to pull the cloak back over the bard’s head in a valiant effort to silence him. Jaskier opens his mouth and instead sneezes once again by way of complaint— but the hesitantly delivered pat atop his head isn't _entirely_ unwelcome. He chuckles into the fabric— at the image of the White Wolf of Rivia patting his barker's head by the breaking fire ( and can practically feel the roll of Geralt's eyes ).

—

" _You_ need a _nap!"_

Geralt snarls, looking remarkably wolfish as he bears his teeth— which isn't an odd occurrence in and of itself with the routine sniffing and occasional growling— but it passes just as quickly as its begun; he wades back into the river and Jaskier can't bring himself to care regardless.

" _Don't come back here, Julian," she says. "This is not love, and I am no conquest."_

They've faught before, obviously. You can't follow one across the continent without having your bouts of disagreement, but it rarely ends with blood spilling from his lips or a tumor bulging around his vocal chords— and it most definitely doesn't end with him waking up to a naked witch crawling towards him.

He laughs airily, all raw nerves and the taste of copper pooling on his tongue— not blood, _chaos,_ he can see in her face that she hungers for it— stumbling back as she stalks after him like some starved but dignified cat and presses a blade to his assets— " _Make the wish, Bard. Relenquish it unto me._ "

So he does. And then he runs. And then Geralt runs back for _her._

He thinks maybe he would have liked Yennifer if it weren't for the knife. Or the fact that she sent his best friend on a bloody rampage, or found herself being fucked by him in the wake of the crumbling building— which, to be quite fair, is none of his business, really, but he can't quite look away. He isn't even really seeing, maybe he isn't really there. Maybe he's just dreaming, and none of this has happened at all. Something settles painfully beneath his ribs.

The elven medic clamps a hand down onto his shoulder and grounds him.

"We should, er..." the man quirks a pained smile. He'd fallen for the witch himself. "We should go."

Jaskier blinks at him.

Jaskier is selfish. He wishes Geralt hadn't gone back into the house. He mumbles something about going into town and pulls from the man's grasp.

And then he is on the path with nothing but his lute slung across his back and he hasn't a clue where he is or how he got there, and the silence is _stifling._ When he touches his cheek his fingers come back damp.

Green isn't his color.

—

Jaskier is almost positive that something is wrong with him. There is a melody that has been plaguing him for quite some time now, day in and day out. He's been playing for hours, days, weeks, months— tweaking it with every go. It's never right. Never enough. Something is always missing.

Presently his lute sits on a chair at his bedside. Its been three days since he'd last picked it up and he feels an ache in his bones that he can't remember procuring. He glances at it from the corner of his eye and his fingers twitch with that ungodly need to play.

_Play me,_ it says, _pull a melody from me just once more._

Jaskier is certain that something is very wrong with him.

_Play me._

He reaches for his lute.


	13. The Lady and The Bard

Julian runs a finger over the rim of his glass and tries to wrestle his focus to no avail. His father drones on and on and the motion continues until Virginia tugs his hand into her lap and intertwines their fingers beneath the tablecloth. Thumbing lightly over her knuckles, he spares her a glance. It'd be something close to romantic, he thinks, if she were not being married off to another man tomorrow.

He swallows and turns his attention back to his father. It doesn't last long.

That night as he caresses her cheek, she will tell him that they will not be seeing each other like this again. He doesn't believe her, he tells her as much. She places a hand at the back of his neck and guides him into the crook of her own.

Virginia of Kerack is his best friend and first lover. She is neither of those things to him— but maybe once she did have his best interest at heart. He can't really say. She's stolen his heart away regardless.

"You are hopeless, Julian."

He mouths at the softness her throat, then brings their lips together. She doesn't turn him away.

—

Geralt catches up with him just before nightfall, which isn't so surprising seeing as he's on horseback and he's too lost in his thoughts to make good pace. Roach canters to his side and bumps his head in reprimand. Her rider shifts against the saddle.

"Don't wander off," his companion murmurs. _You could get lost. Or killed._

"I didn't," the bard huffs. He scratches just behind the mare's ear.

"You did," the Witcher argues.

"I didn't."

Geralt's gaze is weighty on the side of his face; he inclines his head. "You want to leave us."

Jaskier peers up incredulously at the thought, then turns his gaze away. He looks at the Witcher and sees him turn back for the witch.

"Of course not," he says.

"You did," the Witcher says.

"No." _Maybe. I didn't mean to. I don't know how I got here._ Somehow he thinks it unwise to voice such a thought. He strokes Roach's snout.

"Hmm."

Jaskier fiddles with the strap of his lute. The tension perforating the air is uncomfortable, but he really _doesn't_ want to leave. "Did you rest?" He inquiries.

"Yes."

"Good," he says. He wets his lips. "You're a right bastard without a nap."

Geralt rolls his eyes and heels his steed into motion. Jaskier pulls his lute to his front.

_Play me._

He plucks at its strings.

—

Jaskier falls back onto his bed with a huff, accompanied by a stark " _Oof—!"_ as his present companion falls heavily onto his chest. The dwarf, Zoltan, valiant warrior and truest of friends, chuckles into his chest and rolls off onto his side. He pats the man's shoulder— or he thinks he does, anyways. Presently he's rather... well, he's trashed, really.

"I love you, Zoltan," he declares unabashedly. The dwarf claps him hard on the chest— " _Oh, dear,_ " he groans, even as they shift to lay more comfortably beside each other.

"You are a fine man," Zoltan says. "Even if you are a priss. And a twat. And a lass in disguise."

Jaskier sniffs as if trying to work out the insult. Instead he pushes an arm out and allows the dwarf to settle into the space. He chews at his lip and wonders belatedly where he'd left his lute, but at a glance he finds it propped by the door. 

"Zoltan," he says, suddenly. "I believe my instrument speaks to me."

The dwarf snorts. "You're piss drunk, Buttercup."

Jaskier has no argument that might suggest otherwise.

"Sleep, my friend."

Sleep sounds quite good.


	14. The Witcher and the Drunkard

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> one long-ish chapter??? crazy. kinda like it tho-

The thing about being a bard is that nobody gives a damn about you unless you're performing— it's a lot like being a noble, really, except without the safety net of your status to protect you from heckling or otherwise. So in short, when a drunkard strikes you, shoves you into the mud for refusing to play him a song to go with his upteenth drink ( after you've finished up your set for the night, mind you! ) and raises his boot to bust in your ribs— well. It's better to get it over with quietly.

Too bad he isn't good at being quiet. Or getting out of trouble. Jaskier's only priority is keeping his lute from getting kicked in or scuffed. He rushes to his feet but _Melitele's tits,_ there's little purchase in the mud caked about— he falls back to his knees.

" _Whoreson,"_ the man takes a lumbering step closer, sputtering— his heart flutters against his ribs as he scrambles back towards the stables. "What're ye for if not ta entertain?"

His back hits the wall of the stable and he presses flush against it, cradling his lute so tightly to his chest he just might splinter it himself. The drunkard staggers the last few feet between them and raises his boot. Jaskier screws his eyes shut.

The impact doesn't come. There's no cracking of ribs or loss of breath or kicked in teath—

There's a growl; a sea of curses and the thud of a body ( thankfully not his own ) against a far wall— he cracks an eye open, can't help the relieved sigh that falls from his parted lips as he thunks his head back against the stable.

The drunkard writhes pathetically beneath Geralt of Rivia's boot back across the structure, looking both disgusted and terrified, however he can manage it in his state. His companion only adds pressure to his pinned form, stares for a moment before releasing him completely.

"Leave," he spits.

The man sobers up rather quickly— not before pissing himself, of course, and scrambles away from the mess.

Geralt crosses back over the space to crouch beside him. "You didn't call for me," the man says. Jaskier can only imagine the note of bewilderment through the crease between his brows.

"I'm filthy," the bard whines, instead of responding. He drags a hand down the neck of his instrument, presses his cheek to the coolness of her bodice. "At least she's okay."

"She is a piece of wood," the Witcher states, obervationally. The man reaches over, sweeps his fingers across his forehead— pulls a clump of mud from his hair. "You didn't fight back."

"Gods no," he says, blanching. He reaches up to touch his own hair as Geralt raises a brow and takes him by the arm to help lift him to his feet. "I'm a _bard_ , Geralt— and thank you. Fighting might only ensure my death, it's best to let them have their way so that they move on quicker."

His companion's expression falls stony. "You are a bard," he agrees. "In the company of a _Witcher."_

Jaskier doesn't know what exactly prompts the "Huh," that tumbles from his lips as he brushes himself off. It isn't as if he wasn't aware, he just... "And I suppose you'd like it, then, if I called upon you whenever I get into a little bout?" He tuts. "My own big bad wolf? My Witcher in... gut stained leather?"

"Yes."

"Ah—" the bard sputters. Nothing meant by it, obviously, but the suddenness of the man's response turns his stomach; and so he turns toward the door fully, lest his heart flutter straight from his chest. "Well," he continues. "I do get into quite a bit of trouble, Geralt— You'll come to regret those words eventually."

He's fidgeting, he knows— isn't playing his lute more so than plucking at random, and Geralt must recognize this because a warm hand settles against the back of his neck in a companionable gesture. Definitely companionable, he just can't help but remember the feel of them along his waist. He distracts himself as they move toward the door with a final shrill twang of his lute, then starts on something softer— something with character and shape that brings his focus to the feel of his fingers against her strings.

"You'd really do that?" the bard questions, suddenly. "Jump in like that if I asked?"

Geralt's hand falls lower along his back as he ushers him toward their room. "Yes."

"I'm a bard," he echoes. _No one fights for a performer._ Geralt pulls the door ajar and ushers him inside.

"I'm a Witcher," the man huffs.

Jaskier licks his lips. "Witchers _do_ have feelings, you know."

Geralt pats his shoulder, decidedly ignoring his statement, then shoves him ( lightly, for a man of his prowess ) toward the bath. He stumbles a bit-- thank Melitele he doesn't fall— before steadying and relenquishing his lute to their only chair, discarding his doublet and setting to the buttons of his shirt.

"Back in Oxenfurt my colleague Roderick called your kind beastly," he says. "I suppose he's right on some accounts, you _do_ have beastly qualities, such as hearing critters miles away and the strength of ten men, but—"

"Jaskier." _Stop talking._

" _But,_ " the minstrel continues, unperturbed. "You have needs and desires just like every other man. And you care, deeply; dare I say it, more than any man—"

" _Jaskier."_

The bard lets his garments pile onto the floor just this once— they're ruined, anyhow, caked in grime, and settles into the tub. "So I would like you to know, Geralt," he says, finally. He lathers a dampened rag in soap and sets to scrubbing at his skin. "I think— rather, I _know_ Witchers have feelings. I know you are especially kind, even if you try to hide it under that gruffness, and over the last few years I have come to appreciate that kindness— and admire it, actually, among your many other favorable qualities— as well as consider you my closest companion and dearest friend."

The room falls silent. He wrinkles his nose at it, disquieted, but when he parts his lips and lifts his head no words tumble out— instead he startles, just a bit, and pauses his ministrations. The Witcher is crouched opposite him ( always crossing spaces quieter than a mouse ), leaning on the lip of the tub with his head rested on his arms. His brows are furrowed and lips quirked downward as he bores his gaze into Jaskier's, its the most open display of expression he's ever seen on the man.

"I don't know," Geralt says, after a moment. "I don't know what to say. I don't understand you." It's earnest— something in his eyes says he _wants_ to, that he's mulling over Jaskier's words as if trying to pick them apart and decipher them. He remains still— butterflies fluttering ceaselessly in his stomach as the man reaches over and brushes his thumb over the tender skin below his eye. "He got you."

"Oh— am I bruising?" The bard frowns. Their hands brush as he reaches up himself and he tries to ignore it. "How am I to perform with a face like this?"

The Witcher sighs and draws his hand back— Jaskier feels the loss acutely, misses it yet is grateful because he _shouldn't._ "We have ointment," Geralt says, standing and moving back into their room. "I'll get it for you. It'll reduce the swelling."


	15. The Befouler and The Lord

It really _isn't_ his fault that nobles call him to bed. How was he, a passing bard, to know that his courter was the lord's son, or that he was to be married off come the new moon?

"You've gone and _befouled_ my sole heir," the lord bellows. He's positively ghastly as he is, crowding the exit as he gestures about wildly his small clothes. By the light of the candles one could see the distortion of his face by way of confusion and disgust.

And wow, alright— " _Befouled?"_ the bard snarks— and he really should shut up, but the _audacity!_ "Have you not eyes, my lord?" His grip tightens on his instrument— "Why, there's nothing befouling about me!"

The lord snarles something akin to " _Grab him!"_ or " _Gut him!_ " —and the lord's son has the decency to look sheepish from where he's standing with his sheets tugged around his waist— and the guards rush forward. Jaskier has no intention of being beheaded tonight, so he does what any sane man in nothing but a pair of trousers and one boot would do; clutches his lute to his chest and _clambers through the second story window—_

_—_ and safely into the pile of hay just outside it.

The bard laughs something fierce at the lord's shocked face above him, tumbles out of the hay and _runs._

—

Jaskier stares into the mirror with a frown, prodding at the tender, blue-ish purple-ish blotch of skin below his eye until Geralt catches him ( again ) and swats his hand away— " _Ow!"_ He huffs and fiddles with the towel around his waist instead.

"I look atrocious," the bard says. His skin is as damp as the hair that is curling softly against his forehead, not a wrinkle to be seen even as he nears his thirties ( which he is quite proud of, dare he say it ) and his eyes remain their usual cornflower blue, but the _splotch_ just beneath the left— it looks as if it's darkening with each passing moment. "No one will pay me any mind with this blemish, might as well have lost my voice entirely— oh, Geralt, do you hear that?"

"Hmm."

"No, no, listen— It's my career passing by the door without me, off into the night, perhaps to see Val—"

"Jaskier—" the Witcher extends a hand to cup his jaw and angle his face toward him— there's that familiar feeling at the touch and he swallows, heart fluttering beneath his ribs at the gentleness with which the Witcher handles him— "Shut up, don't move, and keep looking at me." And there it goes.

He rolls his eyes. "Quite demanding, aren't you?"

Geralt says nothing, merely dips his fingers into the salve and sets to his ministrations. The man is focused in his motions, gaze fixed unrelentingly unto the offending bruise as if he might be able to glare it away. Jaskier does his best to sit still, to be quiet, distracting himself as much as he can from the frankly stifling silence by studying the man's features. The starkness of his jaw, the light stubble adorning it, the bow of his lip and how they purse in concentration— except he shouldn't be looking, really, not as he was, so he thinks instead of other things.

Thinks of the warbler outside of his bedroom in Kerack, its song ( or what he remembers it to be ), of the gardens then flooded by torrential rains. Wilted flowers smushed into the muddied soil by servant boots and peeling wallpaper, and— oh. He blinks. There he goes again, that familiar feeling of _not being._ Of maybe-petals spilling from his lips, of his own hands that somehow are not his own. As if he has left his body behind, and he struggles to remember where exactly it was that he'd left it.

Something is touching him, possibly— grasping at him, more like. His gaze slips from peeling Oxenfurt walls to a mirror. The young man— no, it's him, isn't it? He's eighteen— sits still in his silly high-collared doublet buttoned up to the base of his throat, stoic as ever. There is a bruise blossoming just below his left eye. Did the cane strike him there? He lifts his hand to touch—

" _Jaskier."_

He's brought back by a hand encircling his wrist and another touching his face— caressing his cheek, tilting his head to meet their eyes. Geralt peers up at him with furrowed brows.

"Sorry," the bard mumbles. He feels flush, his cheeks are no doubt warming under the man's gaze.

"Where did you go?" The Witcher asks, tentatively.

Jaskier tugs his lips into a smile— what else is he to do? "You know us bards, Geralt," he says, sparing the mirror another glance; and his companion allows it this time, turning to meet his gaze through it curiously. His hair is damp and skin lay bare— no doublets or dead eyes, only the towel snug around his waist and Geralt kneeling at his side. "Daydreamers, all of us."


	16. The Sylvan and The Flame

It's when the bard's teeth begin to chatter despite his sweat-slick skin that Geralt loses his patience. Jaskier's eyes follow him as he paces the with enough fervor he might as well pick through the stone floor— It's nearing their third night in this blasted cave and the pounding in his head has yet to relent. More than anything he wants to curl up in this cloak and fall into some eternal slumber, but he can't sleep with the melody nagging at him like a harsh whisper in his ear. Instead he buries his face in the fur lining and sighs deeply.

_Play me._

Three days since he'd touched his lute.

_Play me._

"I feel _ghastly,_ " he huffs. _I'm not sure I could play even if I wanted to._ "Are we sure I'm not turning into some hag?"

_Play me._

The Witcher breathes something akin to a laugh, Jaskier hears his pacing cease rather than sees it. "Don't have the tits for it," he says.

Jaskier snorts rather attractively, doesn't care enough to be embarrassed— "I'm to be a tit-less hag, then."

"No." Geralt shuffles at the cave's mouth.

_Play me._

The bard rubs his eyes and lifts his head; his instrument rests against the wall opposite him and just looking at it makes his fingers twitch. He grits his teeth and looks to his companion instead.

Geralt stands guard with his back to the fire, arms crossed against his chest. To passersby he might look at ease, as if he were admiring the view in the light of dusk, but Jaskier can see the coiled tension in his shoulders. Sees it in the way he messes with his footing every thirty seconds. The barely visible tilt of his head as he scours the wood. 

A Witcher is made to fight, not tend to the sick. He's restless _. Festering._ Near ready to pounce on the next thing that comes through the brush, be it hag or hare. Something fond festers beneath the bard's breast despite it, at how the man cares for him and complains for none of it.

"Geralt," he murmurs. "Do you remember Torque?"

"Hmm."

It wasn't long ago, really. Under a decade still since their Devil adventure, and he could hardly forget the Sylvan kneeling at his side, but the Witcher needed distraction. He was fairly good at being distracting. Jaskier brings his knees to his chest and hums. "The, erm... what was he?"

His companion shifts again. "Sylvan."

"Ah, yes," the bard says. He pauses— _Play me._ Maneuvers himself so that he might rest his chin against his arms. "He was stealing grain for the elves, no? And teaching them to farm?"

"Yes."

"Rather altruistic of him. Are his kind known for such things?"

A moment of passes where there is nothing but the crackling of flame and the faint shuffling of Roach's hooves in the foliage, but the Witcher inclines his head.

_Play me._

Jaskier sighs a bit; lightly, through his nose.

"Most are... peaceful," Geralt says, finally. "Herbivores. Intelligent. They enjoy tending to the plantlife around them."

The man talks like he's reading facts from a book, but the bard finds he hardly minds as his shoulders ease with each passing word. "And they like playing tricks," he continues. "Like asking riddles. Lazy and fat, most, but very strong. Some spit fire."

" _Pardon—_ " Jaskier's gaze slips over to their fire as the statement registers, then back. "They _what?_ "

The Witcher turns a bit, amber eyes flitting over his face. "Some," he says. "Some of them spit fire." 

_Play—_ "Geralt, I apologize—" His gaze flits to his instrument, ignoring the man's raised brow as he pushes the cloak from his shoulders, even as he shivers from the breeze against his bare torso. When he peers up again the man has turned to him fully, brows furrowed. "Could you please hand me my lute?"

"Jaskier—"

"No— erm, yes. I know, Geralt, I should be resting—" He shifts despite himself, holding himself as if it might block out the night's chill. "Please," he says, again. "I've this blasted melody stuck in my head—" he waves a hand about. 

Thank Melitele the Witcher takes pity upon him. He strides over and lifts the instrument with care— knows by now how much it means to the bard.

When he makes to deliver it, however-- just when Jaskier's hand encircles its neck— he pauses. His head lilts curiously, not unlike a dog hearing a peculiar sound, and so the bard pauses with him.

"What is it?"

Geralt blinks at him. "Nothing."

"Um." Jaskier shifts. "My lute, Geralt."

"My medallion."

The bard gives a testing tug, as it seems his companion has no intention to release the instrument himself— to no avail, of course. "What of it?"

The Witcher's medallion hangs still in the space between them.

"Nothing," he says, again. "I thought—" he lets go rather abruptly, allowing the bard to gather his instrument. "Nothing."

It lies silent in his arms.

As Geralt occupies himself with their fire, Jaskier pulls a melody from his instrument and the dull ache in his head begins to recede.

He plays it again, just a tad differently— something still is missing.


	17. Jaskier and The Dozing Witcher

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this one's kinda short tbh, but i'll pick things back up soon.

The last time Julian sees his mother, he is nine years old. It is the day he departs for propper schooling.

Her hands roam his overcoat, move up to tug tersely at his loose curls in a vain attempt at straightening them, rub dirt that isn't really there from his nose and picks non-existent lint from his shoulders. "Rotten child," she sneers. The boy only swallows. "I told your father, private tutoring does little good for children like you. Spoils you. These folk will set you straight, he'll thank me for it. You'll thank me for it."

She flits her gaze over the plains of his face, blue eyes as dead as a still sea, fingers brushing against his collar. Her lips purse just before she leans in toward his ear.

"Thank me, Julian."

He parts his lips, though silent a second too long-- she grips his face fiercely.

" _Thank me, Julian._ "

"Thank you, Mother."

She is not there to see him off as he leaves, nor is she there when he returns home for the winter-- back littered with bruises and little hands scarred from his knuckles splitting.

"Died of something or other this past summer," the cook says. He wonders why no one thought to write-- at the same time can't bring himself to mind.

He begs his father not to send him back to school. His father says next year he may as well grovel. He is ten, if he can't take what life throws his way now he will never make it. He will simply have to do better.

Next time it is hired help fiddling with the lapels of his coat.

\--

Jaskier runs his fingers absentmindedly through white strands gone silver in the moonlight, freshly washed and soft like spun silk as they glide through his digits. They pool in his lap as he meets their end and he sinks his fingers in again, running his nails gently over his companions scalp. It's quiet, but he can't bring himself to mind the lack of conversation with the light snore of a dozing Witcher in his lap.

Geralt looks at peace for once, in the privacy of their little room, with rays of soft light trickling across his normally stoic features. Maybe it's the bed. Maybe it's the comfort of a companion's touch, or maybe it's just because he's _actually_ sleeping for once. Because he can do so knowing the bard will watch over him.

The bard pulls his hand from the man's locks, smooths them in place, and traces the man's features with a finger. He parts his lips, compelled by some unseen force to sing-- "I see the moon," he murmurs, "the moon sees me."

"Shining through the leaves of the old oak tree,

Oh, let the light that shines on me

shine on the one I love.

Over the mountain, over the sea,

back where my heart is longing to be.

Oh, let the light that shines on me

shine on the one I love."

The Witcher shifts against him, only to roll onto his side. Jaskier's lips lilt into a soft smile, his fingers take back to the man's locks.

"I hear the lark, the lark hears me

singing from the leaves of the old oak tree.

Oh, let the light that shines on me

shine on the one I love.

Over the mountain, over the sea,

back where my heart is longing to be,

Oh, let the light that shines on me

shine on the one I love."

He can't quite remember where he learned that one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lullaby is, "i see the moon."


	18. The Dwarf and The Bard

Zoltan holds a scroll practically to Jaskier's nose- he's shaking something fierce, and with it being so close to his face he can hardly make anything out. He reaches out a hand-- Zoltan spins away fiercely, stomping across the floor.

"How on this _blasted Earth,"_ the dwarf bellows, waving the parchment vigorously, "do you manage something like this?"

The minstrel smiles bemusedly at his friend's antics. "Well perhaps I could tell you if you'd allow me to read it," he says. "Careful not to tear it with your parading about."

Zoltan seems not to have heard him, settling himself at the room's provided desk and spreading the scroll across it to read over it twice, thrice-- however many times he's read it before he'd arrived. Jaskier brings himself to the man's side and leans to get a look. Not a letter, obviously-- an official document, one scrawled with utmost care by a practiced scribe--

" _Oh,_ " he breathes.

His companion looks up. " _Inheritance_ ," he says.

"By one Alonso Wiley--"

" _Whoreson Senior--"_

_"Zoltan--"_

_"_ Leaves to Julian Alfred Pankratz, Viscount de Lettenhove, bard Jaskier, the establishment known as Rosemary and Thyme--"

"I'm an establishment owner?"

"Brothel, specifically."

"Oh ho ho!" The bard exclaims through his ear splitting grin, clasping his hands together as he practically bounces about the room. "And yet it can be so much more! Think of it, Zoltan--"

The dwarf raises his brows. "Think of it? What will you do with it?"

" _We!_ " Jaskier rushes back over and clasps his hands over his friend's shoulders. "A tavern, of course. You and I, how about it?"

" _We?_ " the man echoes, incredulously. "A seasoned warrior, a bard, and a tavern."

The bard nods vigorously.

"Have you any idea how to run a tavern?" He inquires.

"Not in the slightest."

They peer back over to the parchment-- if it's possible the bard's smile widens. To own a Novigrad establishment by way of inheritance, simply for his bardic renown-- Zoltan shifts beneath his hands, folds his arms across his chest.

"Well," the dwarf says, "I suppose--"

Jaskier hardly hears him, already cackling and dancing about triumphantly. "We own a tavern! And it will be one of utmost prestige, undoubtedly!"

"Melitele's tits, bard, rouse the whole Inn--"

\--

Its been, well-- a while, since he's seen the Witcher so angry. Although maybe not _angry,_ more confused, scared, uncertainty masquerading as anger. Not that he'd voice any of these things to the man as he broods in his seat before the fire.

Jaskier leans against the bedpost; he shuffles for probably the hundredth time in what could only have been a few moments-- fiddles with his sleeves, the buttons of his doublet, his collar. He'd like to say something but he can't quite find the words. 

_Sorry I inadvertently pegged you with a child, even if it was still, technically, completely your fault._

_You couldn't have known... Well--_

_Who invokes the Law of Surprise as a joke? A man who doesn't believe in destiny. A man with humor as dry as twice burned ashes._

He doesn't feel as if anything he might say will be taken well. The silence is killing him.

"Some months before I met you," he says, "I found a pup just outside a village called Blackwater--"

"Bard." _Shut up._

_Sorry. I can't._ "I named him Beastie, as he was scuffling around my boots so excitedly he'd almost tripped me up. Brought him to the local inn with, and it was there that I met the owner, lovely woman named Sara, scrubbing the bar with impossible vigor. I had not a copper to my name at the time-- well, I had a few. It was either a hot meal for myself and Beastie or a bed for the night, but of course I wasn't going to let the pup starve--"

Geralt hums, so the bard perches himself at the end of the bed and turns his head to the window, content his companion is listening, to continue his tale. 

"It turns out I needn't have worried at all," he says, "for Sara, bless her heart, offered me a room and meal in turn for my services... I played my heart out that night, both by way of thanks and through desperately needing coin. She was do enamored with my performance that she offered me refuge, and I was so delighted that I reached across the counter and kissed her square on the mouth. And she backhanded me, hit me with a filthy rag. Made me sweep the tavern twice with this splinter-y, torturous broom.

I stayed there... Well, I can't quite remember how long-- a week at the very least. Toward the end of my stay I found out not only was she widowed, but she was carrying. I was elated, and also devastated that she hadn't told me sooner-- more-so that I hadn't _noticed_. Afterward I spent days pouring over parchment to craft a lullaby specially for the child-- little cherub I called it, a divine babe born of a saint. Toiled over it. And she wept as I sang it. Her shoulders shook in the candlelight and I thought to myself-- _T_ _his_ is what I've been running toward. I want the words that pass my lips to have purpose and meaning, to ignite eyes and move hearts, and to see it as it happens-- and should I drown in this feeling, I would do so gladly."

The silence is kept at bay only by the crackling of the fire and faint murmurs of the patrons below. Jaskier holds himself-- not quite cold, but--

"And the pup?" The Witcher asks.

The question takes him by surprise, even more so when he turns to look and their eyes meet; he isn't sure when it had happened, but the man had turned to face him fully. In all their time together, he couldn't remember a single instance where Geralt asked him to continue. To have his full attention was almost as stifling as it was invigorating. The bard swallows.

"Beastie," he says, lips lilting into a small smile. "The village folk fell in love with him within moments, it seemed like. Children snuck him scraps and patrons kneeled in the dirt to pet him. Sara kept him, it wasn't as if I could take him with me-- could you imagine if I had walked up to you that day in Posada with a dog at my heels?"


	19. Julian and the Warbler

He isn't quite sure when, how or if he fell asleep-- he remembers leaning against the head rest, tilting his head back against the wood; gazing out at the stars as his fingers pull through his companion's hair. There is the faint crackling of their fire and quiet breaths pushed from the Witcher's barely parted lips. He blinks, and then--

The warbler sings. Julian blinks again from where he's perched, chin in hand from his seat beside the windowsill. The bird ruffles its feathers as it continues its melody and he peers down at his hands, feels familiar silk sleep-clothes beneath his fingers. He awaits the knocking with bated breath, straightens and rubs his eyes.

This time, when his hands fall to his lap and he looks, the warbler isn't there. Its singing continues despite its lack of presence. He stands and takes a step back. Then a second. Unnerved, he lurches forward, grasps the curtains and snaps them shut. The bird ceases its song abruptly and room falls dark. He reaches forward--

There is a fork in one hand and a knife in the other and he cuts into his food-- or was cutting. Now, he pauses, seated at a familiar table. A drop of blood hits the trim of his dish. Then another. He places his silverware down and his fingers twitch. His collar rubs against his throat abrasively. 

" _Julian._ " A soft whisper to his left, a light touch to his arm. They move to catch his eye. Virginia peers up at him, a small smile tugging at her lips. "What ever is the matter?" She asks.

He has never, in all their years together, seen her smile. It doesn't turn his stomach pleasantly, nor prompt his heart to flutter like he thought it would-- his heart hasn't belonged to her in quite some time, not really-- but still, she is his first and truest love. He reaches over to cup her cheek and recoils slightly as his hand is met with stubble.

He blinks.

Geralt of Rivia peers curiously down at him, brows drawn in a familiar manner as he thinks. Julian's hand is still halfway between them where they stand practically chest to chest in an otherwise empty clearing-- he recoils again, harshly, instead pulls at the collar of his infernal doublet. The Witcher has never seen him like... He doesn't know what this is. What he is. Whatever it may be, it's wrong and he doesn't want Geralt to see it. He feels small, his throat is tight, there's the familiar wash of embarrassment as he realizes he might just cry.

The man says nothing, only continues to scrutinize him curiously, so he shrinks in on himself and turns his face away.

He sees himself-- hair mussed, blood dripping from his nose onto his infernal doublet and smeared across his split lips, eyes dead, even as they water. Even as tears spill from them onto his cheeks. The eyes of his mother, as his father had once remarked. He doesn't hear him at first, but he sees in the reflection as Geralt moves to stand beside him. The man leans forward enough that his breath fans over his ear when he speaks.

" _Jaskier_."

"Who?" He breathes. Searing amber eyes meet his through the mirror, flicker across his face. The man reaches around and up and wipes blood from beneath Julian's nose with his thumb. It smears onto his tear-stained cheek.

"Jaskier," the Witcher says, again, firmly. He should know, that much is clear. Why doesn't he know?

" _Jaskier, w_ _ake up._ "

He does so rather suddenly, and with a shuddering breath that he's definitely going to pretend never happened. It takes a moment to gather his bearings-- Geralt peers down at him and he turns his head against the bedding, avoiding his gaze as he gathers his breath. Their room is lit. It seems he had fallen asleep after all-- though he doesn't feel the slightest bit rested, which is a damned shame-- and, what's more, he reasons as he is lying down, Geralt had woken at some point to reposition them.

"Sorry--" he begins, but is promptly quieted by Geralt's hand wiping away a trail of unbidden tears that he hadn't noticed. He says nothing as he goes about this and when he finishes, still leaning over him, his hand finds its way into Jaskier's hair.

The bard peers up at him, swallowing thickly past the knot in his throat. This wasn't something they did-- or, at least, not something that _Geralt_ did. If he was a fool, he might take this as more than a companionable gesture. He wasn't a fool. His heart was, though. A traitor, too.

"Where did you go?" The Witcher questions, beneath his breath.

He wets his lips, but he isn't so sure he can even bring himself to speak. Doesn't know what he would say.

Instead, he shakes his head.

Geralt, bless his kind, stupid-- Jaskier could think of a million ways to describe this man, all fondly-- Witcher-y heart, nods in understanding. "We will stay," he says.

Jaskier blinks, reaches up with one hand to palm at his cheeks himself. "What?"

"We will stay," the Witcher repeats. He moves, slipping his hand from the bard's chestnut locks in favor of draping his arm across the man's chest as he lowers himself back onto the bed. When he settles, he tugs the bard a bit closer-- mindless, almost. _Almost._ He doesn't want to think about it--runs his fingers lightly against the bard's shoulder, pauses before they can slip higher-- so he doesn't. "Another night," he clarifies. "It is nearing midday, anyhow."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> remember, folks-- cuddling is important. so are hugs. hug each oth-- oh, wait, it's the end times. pestilence rides amongst us-- no cuddles for the damned. wash your hands, damn.


	20. The Cub and The Minstrel

Something changes after that-- what exactly that is, Jaskier can't put a name to. Only that his companion's gentleness woke an urge he can't quite dampen no matter how much he tries to push it from his mind. So he doesn't push it from his mind, but he doesn't quite act on it either. He finds himself more liberal in his touches-- reaches across their shadowed table in the back corner of an inn to tuck a strand of hair behind his ear; thumbs dirt from the man's cheek as they eat by their fire a few paces from the path. Small things that do little to nothing to soothe the bittersweet ache of his heart.

Geralt stills each time, flickers his gaze over the bard's face-- always unsure in the wake of it, the bard finds it amusing in a mildly sad sort of way. He doesn't quite reciprocate but also doesn't push him back.

Jaskier is okay with that, he really is-- after all, the White Wolf of Rivia is not only his muse, but his oldest and very best friend. He'd never forgive himself if he squandered such a thing with the silly whims of his heart-- he'll care from a safe distance as he's always done.

\--

He meets-- well, _sees--_ Cirilla for the first time when she is only five, while he plays for yet another Cinturian ball-- it's a miracle in itself he'd been allowed back after the ruckus of her mother's betrothal. There was no thought of turning down the invitation ( not that he could have if he wanted to ). The Lion Cub of Cintra sits beside her grandmother with her hands rested primly in her lap, ashen hair cascading down her delicate shoulders and visage stony enough that he swears he sees Geralt in it, and he's met with a wave of nostalgia so strong that he nearly misses the strings of his lute entirely.

Nearly. He's been at this for years, what kind of bard would he be if he couldn't play with his eyes elsewhere?

She looks just like her mother when she was young, though the she is younger-- and, _oh_ , that was ages ago now, wasn't it?

Her head turns toward him and he turns his own swiftly. His fingers might not ever fail him but his voice just might.

\--

Jaskier sits before the mirror and traces his face, prods his cheek, tilts his head to catch the shape of his jaw and the stubble dusting it. He pays little mind to Geralt's steady gaze-- something is nagging at him.

They've been traveling together for just over a decade. He doesn't look a day over twenty. One would think the road would age a man-- or the stress of constant travel, or gods forbid a _decade_ passes. He is thirty-two years old now, and there's practically nothing to show for it.

"Geralt," he begins-- but, well, now that he's thinking about it, why look a gift horse in the mouth? His gaze flickers to meet the man's through their reflections. "Do you think I should grow a beard?"

The Witcher wrinkles his nose before he can manage to school his expression and Jaskier chuckles some beneath his breath. "I'll take that as a hard _no,"_ he tuts. "I suppose you're right, it'd age me." As he turns away, he thinks Geralt looks rather pleased.

\--

It's _gods-only-know-how-late_ when Geralt stumbles into their room-- _stumbles_ \-- caked in blood and guts and all other sorts of grime he's sure, but he doesn't have time for even a noise of complaint as the man staggers and falls into a kneel _hard._ He's clutching his side, breathing laboriously, stubborn as ever trying to pull himself back up by his sword that mindlessly picks at the wooden flooring.

Jaskier's heart beats so fast it might just break free from his ribs.

"Geralt--" the man himself grunts and struggles back to his feet-- Jaskier isn't stupid enough to sit there and not do something; he rises from his seat with haste and drags it behind the man, who promptly falls into it with a groan. "You sorry man," the bard mumbles. "It's alright, we'll sort you out. What would you do without me, hm?"

He pulls the sword from his grasp gingerly and sets it to the side; his fingers make quick work of the various buckles and straps, and although some bits are heavier than others this is hardly his first time ( even if he does let them drop to the floor with a resounding thud ), and Geralt is as compliant as he can be in his sluggish state. Wounds are cleaned-- the mild are bandaged and worst sitched and then bandaged. He takes a damp rag to the man's face and neck, tucks his hair back behind his ear, promises him a warm meal and bath when he wakes.

( All that in itself had taken some work-- the first time he'd tried to help, the Witcher had snarled like a kicked dog and gnashed his teeth-- which, he supposes, is more than fair, even if it did jab painfully at his heart. )

Said heart flutters through the thick of his ministrations and he babbles relentlessly under his breath, continues to do so as he stuggles Geralt into bed ( and mourns their pristine sheets, though there's little he could do about it ) and joins him. Whispers about everything and distinctly nothing until the man _finally_ gives in to sleep. He wants to smooth the crease of his brow with his thumb. Instead he moves a little closer, closes his eyes.


	21. The Bard and the Barside Brawl

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i re-wrote this like 4 times o-o

It's tense. Jaskier runs his tongue over his teeth and grimaces at the metallic taste, holds himself a little tighter where he leans against the bed post-- a bed _post_ , yes, isn't that nice? It is. It's the nicest Inn they've seen in a while; the bed itself is clean, they have a drafting desk, a table with a water basin and fresh rags-- _not so fresh anymore, who's fault is that--?_ and a complimentary bowl of _fruit._

His gaze slips to the Witcher's boots, but no higher. He knows the man is staring freely at him, slouching against the wall opposite-- and what a sorry sight he is. Blackened eye and bruise dusting his cheekbone, another across his jaw, split lip and bloodied nose; his fingers twitch but they ache from the bruises blossoming across his knuckles, so he stills them. He parts his lips.

The Witcher beats him. "Jaskier--"

"If you're going to say I've done wrong," he says, "I know it. I don't care."

"Jaskier." The boots shift, the bard turns his gaze away as he tics his jaw.

"I'd do it again," the bard breathes. "I _will_ do it again-- as many times as I have to, Geralt. You might think it irrational or stupid, but--"

"You're a bard." _You stay put, I take the punches._

"I'm not incompetent."

"No," the Witcher amends. "You aren't."

"I hate it," he says. Geralt is close enough now that Jaskier can't turn him out of his sights, reaching up to ghost his fingers along the bruises dusting his face. The bard dips his head, squeezing his eyes shut.

"I know," Geralt murmurs, and he does. He just doesn't know what to make of it. Bards don't raise fists for Witchers, no one raises fists for bards-- except Jaskier does, the evidence is beaten into his face and fists, and Geralt does too ( every other minute, really ). "How are your hands?"

Jaskier falls into himself, just a little bit, shoulders hunched as he breathes in. He'll never get over the man asking after him, as rare as it is. "Fine," he says, quietly. He opens his eyes, unfurls his arms after a moment, spreads his hands between them and allows his posture to relax. "They, um--" they _hurt._ A dull incessant throbbing that he can't shake. "... look worse than they are," he finishes.

The Witcher hums somewhere deep in his chest, takes them by the wrist and it comes to him rather suddenly that they're awfully close. He bites his lip and the split opens again-- there's little he can do, stuck between a rock and a hard place ( a bed post-- again, a _post!_ It's rather fancy-- and a Witcher ). 

"They're starting to swell," Geralt mumbles. "Ought to get the salve, otherwise Marx might come for your title."

Jaskier raises his head, and it takes a moment-- Geralt peers down at him with just the barest hint of a smile and it _clicks_ and the bard can't help his grin or the laugh that bubbles out from behind it. _Damn it all,_ he thinks. They stand chest to chest in this moderately spacious lodging, caged against a bed post, and he wants-- well, it doesn't matter what he wants because he _can't,_ but another bit of laughter spills freely from his lips.

" _Bollocks_ ," he says, instead. "Valdo can sing as well a cat in heat, and I could outplay him with one hand."

The Witcher hums. Belatedly, the bard thinks, it resembles a purr. "I don't doubt that."

" _Oh_ ," he says. "So you _do_ take it back about my fillingless pie--"

" _Jaskier_."

"-- and all it took was one barside brawl to admit it? Why, had I known--"

"I change my mind," the Witcher mutters. He lowers Jaskier's hands, brings one of his own up to dust against the bruise on his eye. They aren't holding hands, per se, but Geralt keeps his fingers curled loosely around the bard's wrist at their sides-- _You'll never let me live this down, will you?_

The bard gasps, feigning offense. "You can't just take it back, Witcher. It's a step in the right direction, at the very least; you're that much closer to admitting I'm your very best friend in the whole wide world."

"Hmm."

"Oh, come on," he says, "Thirteen years--"

The Witcher furrows his brows. His hand falters, lowers some to rest at the bard's jaw. "What?"

Jaskier raises his own brow. "What?" he echoes.

"You said--"

"Yes," he agrees. "Thirteen years. I'd know, I do chronicle our adventures."

Geralt blinks again. "That isn't right--"

The bard scoffs. "It most definitely is," he says. "You might not bother to keep track, but I do. I have from the start, it's my job--"

"Jaskier--"

"How am I to immortalize your efforts if I can't even tell a man when and where it happened--" the Witcher's hand slides back up; his palm runs against his forehead, smoothes his hair back-- Jaskier blinks. "Geralt?"

"How old are you?" the Witcher inquires.

He blinks again. "What a rude question--"

" _Jaskier_ \--"

The bard wrinkles his nose, but relents easily enough. " _Thirty-five_ \--" Geralt lilts his head. "Why so curious all of a sudden?"

"You look--" Jaskier narrows his eyes-- " _Young_ ," the man finishes. His hand pushes back further and some of Jaskier's hair falls back into his face.

"Young," the bard echoes, plainly. He'd noticed, gods, yes, he'd noticed quite some time ago. "Yes, thank you, I _am_ young--"

"No--"

" _No?_ "

" _Jaskier._ "

" _Geralt,_ " the bard counters. "While I may, regrettably, be going _up_ in years, I am not yet forty-- _no, don't speak--_ and I _do well_ to take care of myself, thank you very much--"

"Bard," the Witcher huffs--

"I moisturize--"

"You look the same as the day I met you," Geralt says, tersely.

"I know," he says, "I'm naturally very pretty--"

Geralt snorts, more so in disbelief than anything-- " _Thirteen years._ "

"I take _very_ good care of myself."

They lapse into a sort of silence that Jaskier can't quite pin a name to-- _charged,_ perhaps. _Pensive._

Geralt parts his lips--

"Your medallion," the bard interrupts. "Is it tingling?"

"It hums," the Witcher corrects, then pauses. "And no, but--"

"Then that's proof enough, isn't it? I'm not bewitched or cursed. It hardly changes anything, anyhow." He tilts his head a bit. Except-- well, it changes quite a few things, actually, but he doesn't really want to think about them. Geralt purses his lips and Jaskier wrinkles his nose again. "You're just jealous--"

"Jealous," the Witcher deadpans.

The bard nods. "Jealous," he says. "In any case," he continues, lifting a hand to push lightly at the man's chest, "might we move on to the part where we tend to my hands?" Just putting his palm flat seems to irritate his knuckles-- he grimaces, even if it is bearable.

"I have half a mind to leave it," the Witcher says.

"Because you're jealous?" Jaskier huffs, and Geralt gives him a very pointed look. The bard shifts uncomfortably. "I told you," he says, "I won't just leave it as you do--"

"What would you have me do?" the Witcher cuts him off. "Start some mindless brawl? Show them I'm exactly what they say?"

"You _care,_ " the bard says. "That's exactly why I'll keep doing it. I don't mind it--"

"I do--"

" _Yes--_ " he wrinkles his nose again and pulls his hands back, crossing his arms over his chest once more. Geralt's hand falls from his hair, so he turns his gaze toward the window. "I know you do, but _I_ care about _you,_ and you know by now that you can't do a thing to stop me. I wont let some boistering idiot degrade you to a whole tavern, I've made it my livelihood--"

"Jaskier."

"And then something _more_ than my livelihood," he says. "I've made up my mind, Geralt, might as well make peace with it."

Geralt huffs, then-- "Fine--" and Jaskier meets his gaze with a rather startled quickness. 

"Next time," the Witcher says-- and he's sure there will be a next time, because the bard just can't keep himself out if trouble; he gravitates toward it, or it comes for him-- and the bard stares expectantly. "When you throw, make sure not to bend your wrist. Otherwise you might snap it."

He pulls away, then, before Jaskier can make some quip or snark something, and turns toward their packs for the salve.


	22. The Bard and the Rag

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> more geralt-y, as promised! also i don't have a writing schedule buuuut i am enjoying writing this and quarantine really do have me stewing here so expect kiiiinda frequent updates i suppose.

Later that night, Jaskier cradles her delicately in his arms; fingers of one hand find themselves brushing over every familiar plain and crevice. He brings his hand down the curve of her bodice-- there's a sharp crackle to his left. The bard lifts his head and finds his companion staring unabashedly from his seat before the fireplace. Geralt shifts as he holds his gaze.

"You look at it like some woman you've taken to," he says.

" _She,_ " Jaskier says, "is undoubtedly the love of my life-- and unlike any woman--" he dips his head some, at the same time lifts his instrument to see her better-- "she will never break my heart."

The Witcher snorts. "It's a piece of wood," he counters. "You could replace it."

Jaskier tucks her into his chest again, rests his cheek on her neck and scowls at the man. "Ettariel is far more than a _piece of wood_ , you brute. She was a _gift,_ for starters, and--"

"You named it," the other deadpans. 

He watches Geralt rise and make way to the water basin. "No," he says, and the Witcher levels him with an odd look as he dampens a rag. "She already had the name, just here--" Jaskier turns his lute over to show the etchings in the back of her neck. They sit, delicately carved, just below her head.

Geralt pauses by his hip at the edge of the bed and then leans some, both to catch sight of the markings and press the dampened cloth just beneath his nose. The bard furrows his brows as he lifts his hand to replace Geralt's-- he hadn't even noticed the bleeding had started up again.

"You read Elder," the Witcher states.

Bewildered, Jaskier peers up. "Pardon?"

"You read Elder," Geralt says, again. "The markings." He juts his chin toward the instrument.

"Oh."

No, he doesn't-- though he knows what Elder looks like, and, thoroughly perplexed, he looks from Geralt back to her neck; this certainly isn't it. Its written plain as day in the common tongue.

Peering up at Geralt once more, though, the man's interest might be subdued ( as are all his other feelings, really, when he chooses to show them ), but certainly genuine.

"Where did you learn it?" 

Dumbfounded, Jaskier lowers the cloth from his face and stammers, "I- Well, I learned quite a few languages in Oxenfurt-- Nilfgaardian among them, which, as I'm sure you know--"

"Is derived from the Elder Speech," Geralt finishes for him. "Bring the cloth up again."

The bard does so as he continues, "I can hold conversation well enough in the Skellige jargon," he says, "or with a Toussiant native for that matter-- my Ofiri doesn't fare too well at all, though." All of which is true enough, but as he peers back at his instrument he's more than certain Geralt is seeing things-- or worse yet that _he_ is seeing things, because it does make more sense, he supposes, for an elven-made lute to harbor Elder scripture as opposed to the common tongue.

He looks up again-- Geralt sighs, though looks rather amused, and guides his hand back to his face-- "Do you-- right, thank you-- do you happen to know it, Geralt? You recognized the langauge."

Geralt hums. "I understand some," he offers. "My father... _might_ know it. At least, more than I do. He is much older. Wiser."

Jaskier raises his brows. "Your _father?_ "

"Hmm."

The bard waves his hand about, prompting the man to elaborate-- he'd known of a brother ( " _Eskel_ ," he'd said by the light of their fire. " _Not by blood, but my brother nonetheless. A good man._ " ), but Geralt wasn't overly forthcoming. Presently he sighs again and guides Jaskier's hand-- _again--_ to his face.

"Vesemir," he says. "My mentor. He raised myself and my brothers. Father, not by blood."

"Brothers," the bard hums. "You've only ever mentioned one--"

"Eskel. Lambert is young. Stupid, though he is a fine Witcher." A thoughtful look passes the man's features. "He's also an ass. Cynical."

Jaskier raises a brow. "You don't like him?"

"No- I mean, yes," Geralt pauses, furrows his brows. "I do. He's... eccentric. But... good."

Bemusedly, Jaskier parts his lips--

Geralt waves him off. "In any case," the man says. "Vesemir-- I don't know how old exactly he is, but if he is not yet two centuries he is most certainly nearing it--" 

" _Two centuries--"_

"He was there when the keep itself was built," Geralt continues, unperturbed. "So yes," he says, "he might know more."

"So we're brushing past the bit where your father is older than the founding of Kerack?" Jaskier raises his brows.

"You would like him," Geralt says, suddenly.

The bard blinks, then sets his lute in his lap and pats the empty spot beside him. It takes a moment of deliberation, it seems, but Geralt does eventually round the bed and join him. It's a large-ish bed, certainly, but while Jaskier is lean he's by no means a small man-- he comes up at least to the Witcher's nose-- and Geralt most definitely isn't small in any sense of the word, so they end up shoulder to shoulder as they sit against the headboard.

"Is he much like you?" He questions-- because for once, he feels, Geralt is in the mood to talk, and Jaskier himself _is_ curious, and he has no intention of squandering such an opportunity.

"Hmm," Geralt says. Then, "Vesemir is... better. Wise, as I said, but that comes with being the oldest of our kind. He... likes books."

Jaskier can't quite keep the smile off his lips, so he dips his head a bit. Geralt catches it anyways, he supposes, because he hears the man huff.

"He likes books like you like books," he continues, as if that clears up anything. "Sees more than just paper and ink. Vesemir likes knowing."

The bard shifts, tilting his head Geralt's way thoughtfully. "Is that why I would like him?"

"Hmm."

"I do like _knowing_ ," he says. "And I do like books. I'm a curious man by nature, as you know. Always looking for the _why_ behind things, I suppose."

"Yes." Geralt shifts a bit. "You like knowing, Vesemir knows. And he likes talking, like you do. Though I think to him he enjoys teaching, you just like the sound of your voice."

Jaskier huffs indignantly and tilts his head some to rest it on the other's shoulder. "That was a very unnecessary jab." He pauses, then tosses his dampened rag to the foot of the bed and pulls his lute into a position where he can play.

"It's true."

Jaskier can't argue with that.

"I suppose you're saying that Vesemir is a wisened scholar with experience to boot," he says, "and that I would be interested in hearing of his exploits among his more common knowledge."

There's a lapse of almost-silence. Quiet enough to hear his thumb brush against the wood of his lute's neck over the faint crackle of the fire. He tilts his head up. Geralt peers back at him curiously-- it's almost as if his amber eyes glow in the dim light.

"Yes," he says.

Jaskier pulls a note from his lute.

They feel it together, and their gazes drop. Geralt's medallion stills as the note dies.

"Oh," the bard says. "Yes, that reminds me--" he lifts his gaze again and Geralt meets it with furrowed brows-- "I think Ettariel speaks to me."

"What."


	23. The Witcher and the Lute

Jaskier can admit to thinking... _things._ About Geralt. And, well, who can blame him, really? The man is a juxtaposition in his entirety-- big, strong, surely; and also gentle and kind, bearing a heart of the purest gold. Also, he has a very nice-- well, _everything_ , as if happens-- and Jaskier was relatively young, when they met, so it was no surprise really that he'd--

In any case, he hadn't imagined having the Witcher's in bed in _this_ sense; with his lute clutched tightly to his chest and said Witcher looming over him irritably.

" _Absolutely_ _not,_ " he sputters. "Ettariel--"

" _Jaskier._ "

"No!" The bard turns some, aiming to slide off the bed perhaps, and to his credit he _does_ put some distance between them before Geralt takes to manhandling; one hand fists into the fabric of his undershirt, tugging him sharply back into place. "You shan't bully her from my grip with your petty growling nor force, you brute--"

"It's _cursed,_ " the man distrupts.

"Your medallion isn't tingling!" he counters, sharply. "It was a fluke!"

Geralt, more than done with his antics, reaches out presumably to take his lute by force-- Jaskier wriggles once more, plants a foot on the man's chest and _shoves._

In hindsight, this was a mistake. The Witcher, to no one's surprise, doesn't move ( hardly even blinks, really ). Jaskier, however, goes careening backwards off the bed-- or _would have_ , had Geralt not caught him by the calf of his leg. What matters really, though, even if he's hanging precariously, half off the edge of their shared mattress, is that his lute is well out of the man's reach.

Geralt does not share this sentiment.

"It _hums,_ " he growls, "and you are a _fool._ It could be _killing you._ "

" _She isn't!_ "

" _How do we know?_ "

The bard huffs, then takes a moment to leverage-- _struggle,_ more like-- into a sitting position. Their eyes meet-- Geralt's jaw is set in a way he reserves for more troublesome folk ( peeved, really )-- " _Thirteen years,_ you... _oaf!_ " The Witcher bristles.

"If she planned to kill me wouldn't she have done it sooner?" He argues. "And you felt it, besides all that, didn't you--?"

"I felt nothing--"

"And that's proof enough!" The bard exclaims, throwing up a hand. "Wouldn't dying-- _oh_ , _I don't know_ \-- _hurt_ more? Or at the very least feel _unpleasant_?"

Geralt shifts, looking torn between ripping the thing out of Jaskier's grip or conceding to his pleas. After a moment he pulls away entirely, lifting off the bed and moving back to his seat before the fire.

Jaskier huffs a bit, and then, after a moment of deliberation, grabs a pillow and hurls it-- and he doesn't feel the least bit guilty when Geralt turns toward the noise in time for it to smack into his face. He does, however, feel a twinge of _something_ when the man hurls it back with enough force that when it hits he _does_ tumble off the bed. Namely, a severe lack of air in his lungs.

Although any dissent he might've harbored is quickly snuffed by the sight of Geralt's concerned face peering down at him from atop the mattress.

"You know," he says, allowing his head to thunk backward onto the floor, "there are plenty of other, much more pleasant ways to relieve your frustrations."

The Witcher merely blinks-- then his expression softens into something much sadder. "Bleeding," he states.

Jaskier pushes himself up so that he's sitting and wipes at his nose with the back of his hand. It comes away wet with blood.

"Quite alright," he says. "I did antagonize you. Are we agreeing now that manhandling my darling from me isn't an option? We can talk like men, you know."

Geralt huffs from his perch.

"Yes, I know, you claim you aren't man--"

"I am not."

" _Nor_ do you know how to _talk_ like one."

"I talk."

" _Like a dusty old tome--_ not that you should change, it's rather endearing. Move now," he says. "I'd like to sit somewhere that isn't a wooden floor."

For once, the Witcher obliges and moves-- though its more of his incessant ( _sudden_ and _bizarre_ \-- well, that's not _entirely_ true. He'd cared before, but now this was _his_ doing, and it's somehow very different ) desire to tend to the bard's wounds. He makes for the basin to procure another rag.

The bard resumes a seated position against the headboard, as they were mere moments before Geralt had broken whatever reprieve they were in.

"I felt nothing," the Witcher says, again. "My kind were made to withstand magic--"

"You've been bewitched before."

"Yes." He was. By Yennefer, once. And then again, a handful of times by other competent sorceresses, sorcerers and druids alike.

"I understand your concern," says Jaskier, "but it's undue. If she was cursed-- bewitched, what have you-- why would Filivandrel not be rid of her sooner? Would you not have noticed something amiss? I am at your side three quarters of the year, for the most part--"

"You said it speaks." Geralt presses the rag into the bard's palm-- the bard waves it as he emphasizes his words, so he guides the young man's hand to his face ( _again_. ).

"I _think_ she speaks-- and thank you. It isn't as if words flow from her bodice." He tilts his head back to peer up better. "It's like this-- If you stood with Roach--"

"Bard."

" _Listen._ Imagine you are beside Roach. You stand in the barest of lands, hardly anything of interest in her sights, and you are steadfastly ignoring her while you inspect one thing or another." 

He raises his brows, but Geralt only stares passively, so he continues;

"Dusk falls, and yet still you have not tended to her. She grows restless, and what does she do? Whinnies. Nudges. Stomps her hooves--"

"It calls you to attention."

"Precisely!" He says. "I tried, once, to ignore it-- Lasted three days. It became incessant--"

"How long have you--"

"And it happened again, some winters ago as you tended to me while I was sick. We were in that cave along the--"

"Yes." Geralt situates himself at the edge of the bed. "My medallion pulsed as I handed it to you, but it lasted only a beat. I ignored it, I thought--"

"I must have hit the strings as you passed her over," the bard says. "They would've quieted as soon as I had a firm grip, so it's no surprise you thought you imagined it. Anyhow, the call is far from malicious. All she asks is that I play her-- always the same melody, but I can never get it right."

The bard lowers his rag in favor of taking Geralt in-- he looks rather pained as he stares at the far wall, in the way only a Witcher who'd missed the presence of a sentient instrument under his nose for the last thirteen years might. Relatively confident that the man won't dive for it, he sets Ettatiel aside and thumps a hand against the other's arm.

"You needn't look so sorrowful, my dear friend," he says. "Perhaps I should've mentioned it sooner--"

"Perhaps?"

"Alright, I _should_ have mentioned it _f_ _ar_ earlier-- but to be fair, would you have listened? Not back then, surely."

"Hmm."

Jaskier raises his shoulders. "Nothing to do about it, I suppose."

Geralt huffs, and in one motion mounts the bed and falls back into the bard's lap. "We could take it to Yen, she'd--"

"Absolutely _not._ "

"You can't just..." The Witcher, lost for words, waves his hand. "Just because it hasn't doesn't mean it _won't._ "

"I _can,_ " the bard insists. "I've been doing it for thirteen years."

Another wave of the Witcher's hand. "We will find Yennefer--"

"No _._ "

"Bard--"

" _No._ "

Geralt furrows his brows and the bard huffs indignantly even as he pushes his hand into the Witcher's hair-- despite his petulance he is firmly set on his decision. 

"You would have us..." _Stew on it? Do nothing?_

"Yes. No--" Jaskier wrinkles his nose-- "We could... I don't know, Geralt. This is your thing, not mine--"

"And you refuse it." _My input. My help._

He thunks his head against the headboard. "I am not refusing _you,_ I am refusing the _witch._ "

Geralt snorts. "Your quarrel with the sorceress is petty. And lacks importance, especially--"

"I have no _quarrel_ with the witch," he interrupts. He really doesn't-- he suspects, had they met under any other circumstance, they might actually have gotten along. In some semblance, at least.

"You don't like her."

Ever dramatic, Jaskier loosens his hand from Geralt's locks so that he might gesture fervently.

"Don't like her?" He says, bitterly. "I _despise_ her. Greatly. I'll hear no more of it, thank you, Geralt."

The Witcher parts his lips--

" _No_ , Geralt."

"Fine," he says. "In the morning we will talk."

"We will talk," the bard concedes, "but not about _this._ "

"About..." Geralt meets his eye, then-- and in turn notices a certain lack-of pressure below his nose, so he takes the rag and puts it there himself. "... _her_ ," he finishes. "The lute."


	24. Julian and the Crow's Feet

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wasn't too pleased with the last chapter so have some Angst

" _Julian,_ " the countess murmurs by his side. "You've hardly aged since we last met. Somehow it seems the road agrees with you-- though it most certainly does not agree with your boots."

She's right, as it happens. His present boots are worn rather thin from his travels, and he hadn't gotten around to replacing them. Fine boots were hard to come by in backwater villages, not to mention took a fine chunk of coin to procure, and besides all that he'd been mulling over his companions suggestion of a sturdier pair.

Although, he supposes, there is no need to mull over things any longer.

A hand pressed to the small of his back anchors him. Virginia regards him stonily-- and while he has hardly changed, she _has_ ( Time etches its way into everything-- the warbler nest outside his bedroom window lies abandoned. Her cheeks have hollowed some, and there are faint creases around her mouth. She is no less beautiful. ) and it twists something painfully in his gut-- though her eyes betray her amusement.

"Why have you returned, Julian?"

\--

"Jaskier."

"Yennefer."

"The crow's feet are new."

\--

" _This is not love,_ " she had said, " _and I am no conquest._ "

She was never a conquest, but she _was_ his love-- and she must know it, otherwise they wouldn't be here again; he--

" _Julian_."

He covers the name with his lips but it rings in his ears, so he trails his mouth down her neck instead. There's no outrunning it, he knows this now. He should never have left--

" _Julian,_ " she says again. Her delicate hands slip across his chest, roam his shoulders. One slides higher, weaves into his hair and tugs insistently enough that he pulls back to meet her eyes.

Virginia's gaze roams his face unabashedly. Try as he might, he gleans nothing from hers.

"Stay here," she says. "Here with me, just now."

She _was_ his love--

\--

Jaskier recognizes this creature-- he _does_ listen to Geralt when he speaks, only usually he elects to ignore it ( It's what they do. They listen, they just pretend not to. )-- and so when it stands and he sees the ribs jutting from beneath its skin, he knows he has bitten off more than he can chew, so he turns, and--

" _Geralt!_ "

\--

Yennefer's knight slaughters the poor thing despite Geralt's intervention and it leaves him rather... disappointed ( by the haste with which men turn against what is different, be it for honor, love, bloodlust or fear ). Jaskier brushes his hand against the Witcher's elbow, but the man's attention is elsewhere.

\--

It does not surprise him when Geralt leaves him to join her in her tent, though it hurts no less.

\--

Jaskier pulls a hauntingly familiar yet forever elusive melody from his instrument. By now it is second nature, he gazes into the fire and doesn't bother resisting Ettariel's pull. He is lifted from his reprieve as the melody ends, only because it is _still_ wrong.

His gaze rises and he startles at his audience-- their camp is quiet besides the rustling of leaves in the wind and the crackling of their fire, and far too many eyes are turned to him. Geralt's gaze is incessant so he turns; Yennefer stares him down like prey. The silence pulls far too long--

_Stifling, stifling, stifling--_

"What were you singing?" Borch asks.

_Singing?_

His gaze flickers to the old man-- he thinks he sees something flash in his eyes, but it must be the fire.

"Oh," he stammers, ( His voice seems to snap everyone back into motion. Eyes are diverted, others move off or simply gaze elsewhere ). "I-" _I don't know, I don't know._ He looks back to Geralt, but Geralt is looking to the witch, so he turns his gaze to his boots instead. 

"It's rather old," he says. "Pulled it from the dustiest tome in Oxenfurt back when I was only a student, I... I don't remember its name. Funny, isn't it, how the lyrics stick?"

\--

Julian lies with his head against her stomach, an arm thrown across her waist; she cards her fingers through his hair.

"You never did tell me why you returned home," she says.

He shifts, presses a kiss to the softness of her belly.

"I've come to claim my title," he says. "Formally, that is."

Her hand stills. "You wish to be viscount?"

"I do."

Virginia huffs something akin to a laugh.

"No," she says, "you don't."

\--

"If life could give me _one blessing,_ it would be to take _you_ off my hands."

\--

Julian sits at his window and looks out over the warbler's rotting tree. He wonders what it would be like to fly-- _or fall--_ from it.


	25. Julian and the Witch's Embrace

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh gods oh no more angst-- oh, sweet agony

The Countess de Stael frequents both his bed and parlor in her husband's absence. Her presence at his side is likely the only reason he hasn't wasted away in his new position. Not that he's incompetent, he's been groomed for this-- he's just...

He _can't_ be still, never has been able to for fear of dissipating ( That's what it feels like, anyways. The way he slips from himself, the way his mouth fills with petals. ), and it's driving him mad. No amount of walks through the garden can quell the urge-- he taps, he paces, he pulls books from shelves just to put them back--

"You don't change at all, do you?" she quips, but it's said with a sort of fondness he can't quite place. "Quiet your mind, Julian-- there is work to be done if you are to stay. Look, I'll help you keep focus."

Sometimes he plays for her at the foot of the bed, sometimes he gets carried away. Ettariel warbels and his voice accompanies, and when he looks up he finds Virginia sitting amongst the sheets with her head lilted. Her lips part but her gaze is far away, almost as if she is remembering something.

She's the one who notices-- to no one's surprise, Virginia had always been the one attuned to her surroundings-- sitting bare before her reflection after one such evening.

" _Julian_ ," she breathes. He moves to stand behind her, runs his fingers across her cheek; she lays her hand atop his, then reaches higher. Her fingers clasp his night shirt and pull. "You have made me young again."

\--

Zoltan finds them together in the garden-- the dwarf looks as bewildered by the sight of him as he has felt since stepping foot in his place. Worlds are merging before his very eyes-- but that isn't right, is it? He's the same as he's always been. Julian--

"Jaskier," the dwarf says, and he blinks. " _Buttercup_ , what on earth d'you think you're doing here?"

Virginia turns her face toward him, brows furrowed. "Julian," she murmurs. "Who is this? A friend of yours?"

Zoltan snorts. " _Julian_? Lassie--"

"No," he finds himself saying. His old friend's gaze slips back to him. "Er, yes, my lady-- Might I introduce you to my former companion, Zoltan Chivay? And Zoltan, my dear friend, I might introduce the Countess de Stael, my--"

"Jaskier," bemused, intermingles with, "Julian," recognition, and he's grateful he's sitting because he fears had he not been he might've lost his footing entirely.

" _That_ countess?" The dwarf murmurs. "Isn't she meant to be old as shite by now?"

Virginia curls her lip--

" _Right,_ " Julian says, " _No_ , actually, I happen to have a few years over the fair lady-- Virginia, dear--"

" _Julian._ "

Zoltan snorts again.

"I apologize on behalf of my old friend's insolence," he finds himself saying-- and the dwarf grunts in offense, though he says nothing-- "But I must ask you to part with us, if only for a moment."

Evidently she doesn't find the dwarf worthy of courtly etiquette, he knows this because she rolls her eyes before patting his cheek. "I will leave you. I would call it a pleasure," she says, eyeing the dwarf as she makes to depart, "but it seems I've turned crotchety in my old age."

\--

He can't pull himself from it. It is so quiet now, and his heart sits like a stone in his stomach-- at the same time lies at his feet shattered twice over.

" _Rotten child... A fifth because you never learn-- Silly Julian, you are hopeless. What are you for if not to entertain? This is not love, you do not know it. How could you ever think--_ "

Julian blinks and blinks again but still he cannot see. He's left something ( _someone_ ) very dear to him atop that gods forsaken mountain-- _No, it's hardly the mountains fault._ And, try as he might, his quill continues to slip from his fingers. It's too quiet and yet his thoughts are too loud; he gives up writing-- he thinks something moves, maybe it was himself-- when the ink spills-- and something touches his face-- "... _ard_ \--" and the ink spreads, and try as he might he finds it becomes harder and harder to breathe--

He must be choking.

" _Bard_ _._ "

Wilted flowers stuff both his lungs and throat full.

Something _does_ move-- it can't be himself, as it comes _toward_ him-- " _Leave now_... _move_." He must've done something-- he'd know what if he was listening, but he _never, ever_ listens. _He only ever does wrong_ \-- the cane only ever comes down for a reason but he can't help but part his lips to speak, to apologize, to plead, but all that falls from his lips is a sob-- and they move again. Belatedly he watches his own hands raise, but what is the point of protecting himself? It's best to let them get on with it--

The cane never comes, the hit never connects with his cheek, nor does the first meet his nose or boot meet his chest. Instead something takes to his hair-- there is fabric pressed to his cheek, an arm securing him relatively in place and words murmured into his hair. He tries to hear, but he can't. He _can't_. A second arm slips across his shoulders to shelter him further and it stirs _something._

_"_ _Jaskier._ "

Julian's reprieve shatters for the first time in _gods-only-know_ how long ( _Jaskier_ is everything he wanted to be. Everything he knew he couldn't, it was only a matter of time-- ) with lips to his temple-- or splinters, more like. He breathes for what feels like the first time in ages and he is _somewhat_ aware, but everything is muted-- he palms at his eyes with one hand and it comes back wet as he expects--

"There you are," she says, and she smooths his hair back just as _he_ had. "I see you, come to me."

He blinks, takes another shuddering breath. Yennefer of Vengerburg guides his head into the crook of her neck and embraces him ( And it makes no sense, and he wants to hate her but he can't. He's so tired. ) as he cries freely in the dim light of a tavern at the foot of a mountain, as Alexander had done all those years ago.

" _You are not happy,_ " he had said, and it wasn't a question then, and it isn't one now.

_But I was._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> #YenneferOfVengerburgIsLike200YearsOldAndKnowsTraumaWhenSheSeesItAndOhGodThisButtercupBoyIsMyBabyNow


	26. Geralt and the Clinking Coins

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i was nicer to u this time, have some geralt pov as a treat

He sits at the backmost table in the usual manner-- shoulders hunched and hood drawn. Small, small, smaller-- All manner of Witcher is too much, too imposing; Geralt just happens to be even more so-- it's no use. He's different, even from his brethren ( always has been something _more--_ and something _less_ at the same time. ). Women and children fear him. So do men, sometimes.

Who is he kidding? Everything fears him.

" _Butcher._ "

He shifts once more. Maybe if he caves in on himself he'll take up less space, then everyone will be able to breathe again.

And then the bard sits _beside_ him, not _across--_ and he's the first ( Human, that is. His brothers sat beside him often enough, and eventually his mentor-- _father,_ he likes to think; it's indulgent, he's too old for such sentiment and surely Vesemir would laugh in his face-- had, too. ), and everything shifts. His companion is close enough that his scent cloys most of the reek this tavern is steeped in, loud enough that it distracts him from the rest of the noise. The bard leans in close, and then closer still, just because he can.

There are very few scents he tolerates-- Chamomile, honeysuckle, lilac and gooseberries. The bard smells of _instances_ , not _things._ There's no name for it besides _i_ _nhuman_ , in the broadest-- dare he say _nicest--_ sense; he smells like the earth just after it rains, when sunlight breaks through the clouds and branches and warms your face-- and looks like it, too. 

If spring were rolled up and made into a man, he thinks, it would be Jaskier. He's different, especially in comparison to his bretheren ( he's something _more,_ in every sense ).

He thinks-- Yes, he thinks. And thinks, and thinks, and never says. He takes up too much space as it is, better to save his breath for when someone _needs_ it. The Witcher leans against the table instead ( it creaks under his weight, as does everything ) and pinches the bridge of his nose.

As always, Jaskier takes note.

"Does something ail you, Sir Wolf?"

"Hmm."

"I see," the bard says, unperturbed. "Not in the mood for banter-- If you wish to retire, I've paid for our room. We could go, I could have them draw a bath; in fact, I will--"

_We,_ the bard says, and Geralt hums.

"Nothing like a warm tub to put tired muscles to rest, don't you agree? I booked us the topmost room, insisted on it. Farthest from the bustling, so--"

"You don't wish to perform?" He asks, because it's much better than hearing about how the bard wishes to _accommodate_ him.

Switches his soaps out for new ones, _unscented,_ because, " _Y_ _our nose wrinkles sometimes as we pass through_ _villages. The smells bother you, don't they? I figured that might fall unto other things as well._ "

Notices things Geralt doesn't-- How long have they been in each other's company now? He isn't sure, the days blur together regardless of company at this point, but it must be a while if the bard can see so much of him-- like his preference for one type of fabric over another.

The way he _tolerates_ crowds-- too noisy, too much bustling; the bard offers to gather supplies for him ( he doesn't indulge, but doesn't stop the man from putting himself between him and bystanders ).

The way noise grates on his nerves ( Hence the topmost room, far as one can get from the hollaring, clanking and thunking. It won't be enough, but the thought soothes more than he cares to admit. ).

Everything about him is _better, stronger, too much._ That's how its always been-- " _But why endure when you can accomodate?_ " the bard asked. " _Just because you can handle it doesn't mean you have to._ "

Jaskier raises a shoulder. "I suppose we could always do with a bit of extra coin," he says. It isn't what Geralt meant. He shifts to catch a glimpse of the young man as he gathers his lute.

That was a habit the bard seemed unable to break; as indulgent as he seemed, he'd bend at just a nudge for the right person. Skewer suggestion for direction and take to it like a moth to torch, overeager to please.

"I meant," he says, then pauses. "You said we."

Gods above. He sighs-- Melitele knows why he bothers speaking when it all comes out jumbled anyways.

Jaskier blinks, cornflower blue eyes just a shade darker in the dimness of the tavern's back corner. The bard inclines his head brows furrowing. "I did," he says. "Is that-- I'm sure I could scrap up enough for a room, if--"

"What," the Witcher mumbles. It rolls off his tongue wrong, but the bard ceases his rambling regardless, takes instead to fidgeting with the case of his instrument.

"I meant," he tries again-- because he'd heard once, from someone, somewhere, maybe, that relationships take _effort,_ and the bard was, unfortunately, growing on him ( less like a thorn, more like-- well, whatever flower could possibly blossom on the road ). "You looked... excited. To come here." For the people, he'd assume; the chance to converse with someone other than a half-mute Witcher or a horse-- the bard is insufferably patient as he gathers his words. "You don't have to play, if you need rest. We can go. I was asking--"

" _Oh,_ " Jaskier breathes ( as he always does when something clicks ), and Geralt huffs, amused ( _fond_ ), as he always is when the bard does it. "You were asking after me."

"Hmm."

"Go, you said--"

"To our room."

"So you don't... I could, still--"

He raises a brow and asks, "Why?" _Why would I?_ But the bard only quiets, so he tries again. "Saves coin this way."

Jaskier parts his lips, then closes them, and then parts them once more.

"Yes," he says. "Ah-- well, as it happens, I am a bit knackered. Perhaps-- er, how long do we plan to stay? If we stay until day after I might strike up with the innkeep tomorrow evening, because I _do_ wish to play but not coated in a day's worth of grime and such; just isn't the sort of impression I'd like to make--"

As much as the bard may be growing on him, the man's mouth is ceaseless, so the Witcher decides he's put enough effort in for today ( perhaps for this week ); he takes a dreg from his tankard and focuses instead on his surroundings.

Listens to the creak of the floorboards, the thud of a door slamming shut, the disjointed pounding of hearts, tapping ( a nervous drunk in the corner ), scratching ( a knight carving into the wood of a table ), moaning ( a man and his conquest on the floor above )-- a tankard thunks, armor clanks, coins clink against the bar top, Roach shuffles in her stall outside.

Jaskier sighs deeply, dramatically, and Geralt casts him a glance. "You've stopped listening to me," the bard accuses with a pout. He reaches forward and takes Geralt's drink, smells it and wrinkles his nose-- the Witcher only blinks ( he doesn't think even his brothers would try to take from him )-- but brings it to his lips anyway.

He makes a face.

"Tastes as bad as it smells," the bard says as he passes it back. "Horrible. I don't know how you endure it--"

Geralt takes it, shrugs, makes a show of downing the rest in one go.

" _Barbaric,_ " Jaskier accuses, but his grin brightens their dark little corner-- and then he laughs as Geralt gestures the barmaid for more, and it brightens the whole room.


	27. The Sorceress and The Lark

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> honestly wondering how long i can keep this story going, like what if i just become some obsessed old gay man still writing extremely slowburn witcher /fic forty years down the road?

Zoltan makes himself comfortable on the bench beside him, and instead of speaking they fall quiet.

But he can't stand the quiet, so he clears his throat, shifts in his seat--

"You cannae coop yerself up here," the dwarf says. "No offense, Buttercup, but ye look like shite-- and must be feelin it if yer on that _Julian_ nonsense."

Julian wrinkles his nose. "Offense quite taken, actually," he scoffs. "I look--"

"Jaskier, your face is hallowed. Nearin' sick like. Never seen you so small, which is sayin' somethin'."

_Fine,_ he would've said. Though it's true, he has lost _some_ weight-- he's every bit the man he was before he'd left this place. Zoltan's hand finds his back, a steady weight against him. He allows himself to lax in his posture.

"What're you doin' here?"

Julian picks at a thread hanging from his sleeve. "You know what I'm here for, otherwise you wouldn't have found me."

"Eh, the viscount shite?" The dwarf huffs a laugh, thumps him solidly on the shoulder ( which, _ow, really--_ ). "I'm meant to be takin' that serious?"

"I'm good at--"

"Aye, no, you are. I've no doubt. Just isn't you, is all."

"What Julian nonsense?" He asks, after a moment's pause. "It's my given name--"

"Jaskier is yer name. Julian is... somethin' else like." Zoltan hums. "An old, dead part of ye that ye trip on when somethin's weighin' ye down-- it's Geralt, innit?"

"Why would you think that?"

"Because yer here, instead of with him," the dwarf says. "An' he's a bleedin' idiot."

\--

Yennefer has seen too much, heard too much, done too much in her time. The Witcher is young-- old to a human but nothing compared to her-- and his bard younger-- a lark with a voice as warm as a hearth to a home she'd never been, a fledgling wielding Chaos so raw, so delicately, that she, the careless fool she is, slipped beneath the warm words and nestled herself there.

Had he not stopped, had he found the words he was so desperately searching for-- well, she isn't sure what would have happened. That's what she'd come to find out.

Instead she found the lark lost, withdrawn so deeply into himself that not her voice nor touch brought him to attention. Instead he spills his ink, and his eyes flicker to it, and then to her, and she _startles_ at the lack of usual brightness. Humans were fragile, weak, pitiful, and once she was all of those things too ( all except truly human, her elvish blood was a testament to that )-- and her wrists ache in familiarity. In a way they hadn't in a long time. The bards eyes, deadened as they regard her ( no, as they look _through_ her ), slip back to the ink.

She doesn't know what happened after she left the mountaintop, but whatever it was must only have been the last drop to an already overfull cauldron.

His breath quickens as the blackness creeps closer.

She reaches-- and he flinches, he _fears_ her, or some semblance of her, and Yennefer _loves_ to be feared; except she doesn't, not now. ( She's seen too much, heard too much, done too much-- everything except _this_. ) Now she is _wanting,_ and she always gets what she wants.

The sorceress tucks the lark's face into the crook of her neck, holds him until he gathers his breath ( murmurs absentmindedly against his hair ), and he must've broken a wing or two ( or a heart ) because he loses it again in a choked whimper. Jaskier-- the fool of a bard named for a _flower,_ of all things-- is bigger than her, and taller than her, and yet so tiny in her arms ( and so powerless ). Her hand moves up, she runs her fingers through chestnut locks.

He fists the fabric of her dress and pulls closer, melts into her embrace, finds his own _warmth_ in it. 

Yennefer has felt warmth, felt _fire,_ and it _burned_ and she _relished_ in it. She's felt ( _heard, seen, done_ ) so much, but never this. Never held a man to her breast just to hold him there. Never carded her hand through a man's hair as he wept-- Geralt doesn't _weep_ , nor do they act with such intimacy.

She's always wanted what she cannot have, but it strikes her then just how much she is missing ( as painfully as the child she left on that beach ), and she presses her lips to the lark's hair.

\--

She finds him again in a garden, with a dwarf gutsy enough to rise and brandish an axe at the sight of her. She parts her lips with every intention of blasting the man to bits--

And the lark, ever careless, ever stupid, scrambles from his seat and leaps in front of her. In front of _her,_ as if she were some helpless maiden, as if-- The axe halts, the lark makes an affronted noise as he spins on his heel to face her.

"What on Melitele's good earth is going on today?" He questions, airily, and she's taken back ( by his paleness, by the darkened circles beneath his eyes, by the way his shirt hangs loosely across his frame ). "How are you all finding me, and why?"

And she is _wanting_ so she reaches, brushes the back of her fingers along his cheek-- and he allows her, though with tension coiled tightly in his shoulders. He fears her ( he _should_ fear her, yet how _dare he,_ after what they'd shared _)_. It twists something rather painfully in her gut. "I should have come sooner."

"A friend?" The dwarf asks.

"Yennefer of Vengerburg," she says. "Sorceress."

"Ah," _recognition_. She raises a brow, hand lowering as both her and the lark turn to look. "Geralt's lass."

" _No_ ," they say together. Her lip curls distastefully.

\--

Zoltan regards the sorceress stonily, and Julian comes to wonder how he'd manage to befriend so many rocks disguised as people and when they'd suddenly sprouted some semblance of feeling toward him.

"Hm," the dwarf hums. "He's fucked you both, then?"

"Yes," Julian says, then, eyes widening even before Yennefer's head snaps his way, fervently yelps, "No! I meant to say no! I mean, _yes_ , but _no_." And it's all rather eloquent, his rambling-- and the sorceress takes his face in her hand-- _"Thank me_ , _Julian_ " his mother sneers-- his breath stutters and he grasps her wrist, Zoltan tightens his grip on his weapon. "I only meant he had thrown us both under the carriage, I hadn't--"

She releases him in a flourish, accompanied by a roll of her eyes, and regards his companion once more.

" _Oh_ ," he breathes, "Er, yes-- Yennefer, this is Zoltan Chivay. Very dear friend, we own a cabaret--"

"A brothel."

"A _cabaret in the works_ together."

Disinterested, the sorceress elects to ignore both his words and companion. "We must talk privately," she says-- "There was something I meant to ask in that dingy tavern some months back, only I never got around to it, distracted as I was."

"Well," the bard says, "whatever you must say can be said in front of my companion. As it happens, I've quite a few guests today--"

"Your spellwork," she says, chin raised. "It is old, powerful-- _barely_ held together. I want to know where you learned it and what your intention was back on the mountain."

Julian blinks owlishly, parts his lips, then closes them-- Zoltan mutters something regarding, "Witching women," to which Yennefer glares venomously-- and he shakes his head. "I'm-- I _was_ a bard," he says. "I don't know the first thing about spellwork-- You're talking about--"

"I know very well what I'm talking about," the sorceress says. "The song was teeming with Chaos--"

"Ah," says Zoltan. "I understand, the lass--"

Yennefer waves a hand and they watch, bewildered, as a whisp of _something_ shoots from her fingers-- right into Zoltan's face. The dwarf scrambles as if a spider had fallen into his hair, sneezes with vigor-- "Be silent," the woman says-- and the dwarf does fall silent, much to his own chargin-- and turns back to him. "Explain."

"Is he--"

" _Explain._ Now."

"Right!" He says. "My lute--"

Yennefer frowns. "I care not for your instrument, Bard."

" _Viscount,_ " he corrects. "I must ask you do not interrupt-- If I am to tell you correctly, I must start at the beginning." He turns, motions his old friend toward one of the benches and seats Yennefer on the one adjacent, where she regards him with painful indifference, but resigns herself ( just as Zoltan had, with a prolonged sigh ) to his tale.

Julian clears his throat-- "It all starts in Posada, where Geralt and I met for the first time, and where we encountered a devil who was no devil at all, but really a _Sylvan_ by the name of Torque-- and what _fascinating_ creatures, I must tell you--"


	28. Julian and The Mad Sorceress

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just wanna say i do read all your comments and they make me super happy i'm just really awkward and never know what to say back haha i'm sorry

Julian watches, wide eyed, with bated breath and one hand outstretched halfway between them, as Yennefer turns Ettariel in her hands.

"Be-- erm--" The sorceress peers up through her lashes, and not for the first time he finds himself startled by the brilliance of her violet gaze. "Careful," he says, dumbly. It's a wonder she hasn't turned him to ash thus far. "Er-- you're always careful, of course, I only mean to say--"

Her gaze flickers back to the instrument, she runs her gloved fingers gently down its bodice, then brings them back up again to point to the neck of the lute.

"This is Elder," she says. "For--"

"Ettariel," he interrupts, nodding.

"And who translated the scripture? Our old friend?" _Geralt? The Witcher, the White Wolf of Rivia, the-- "You're that much closer to admitting I'm your very best friend."_

Julian swallows and inclines his head, sheepish. "No. I did."

"You did?" The sorceress hums. "Curious. They teach the Elder Speech in Oxenfurt, do they?"

"No," he says. "It's in Common."

"Explain."

"How?" He furrows his brows. "He-- our... _old friend_ , saw it as Elder as well. It surprised me, I thought--"

"You thought an instrument as old as this," she says, "of _Elven_ make, handed to you by a _King,_ was named in the Common Tongue?"

He purses his lips.

Yennefer inclines her head, lifts her gaze again to meet his. "It is an old gift," she says. "One suited well to a bard, being a man of both tale-weaving and song. Allspeak. It is not of our world."

"Allspeak," he echoes.

She turns the instrument once more, holds it to her middle in shoddy mimicry of how she had seen him hold it once. She plucks a note-- it rings sour, Julian both winces and grits his teeth. The corner of her mouth lilts in amusement, but it quickly passes.

"Yes, that which you speak of I believe to be Allspeak," she says. "Yet I feel no Chaos within this wood. I felt it atop the mountain, just beneath your voice--"

"Because you are playing her wrong," he says, outstretching his hands fully. The sorceress pays them no mind. "I give her means to sing properly, she merely accompanies my voice. On occasion she asks of me. To play. To sing. She doesn't like being put down long."

"You were singing what she asked of you," Yennefer concludes. "There was no intent besides calling us to attention, she wished to perform for an audience so she made one." She thrusts the lute forward into his awaiting hands, takes to encircling him as he clutches it to his chest. "Next."

"Next?" He breathes.

"Allspeak, sentience. _Next_."

"Er--" Julian blinks. "I am into my forties, now, and the fair countess rests not even a handful of years behind me, yet--"

" _Oh,_ " she says, eyes flashing. "Very good."

"When I arrived," he says, "her cheeks had hallowed some. And there were lines of aging--"

"And you made her young again."

"Yes."

"Through song?"

"Yes," he says, again. "Though her song."

"Play," she prompts, so he does; his fingers move across her strings almost of their own accord, and he relaxes infinitesimally as he goes.

Yennefer pauses at his side, presses a hand to his arm and closes her eyes. "How often have you sung to Geralt? Sung to yourself? My little lark, how far have your lives been extended?"

" _Oh,_ " he startles, though he continues flitting his fingers across the strings. It makes sense, seeing as he had sung Virginia to youthfulness again, seeing as he hasn't aged since he was practically twenty. And the Witcher-- "He ages slowly already," he says, "Neither of us would have noticed, there was nothing to change."

"Decades," she says.

"Yes."

"And it only took--" She dips her head. "Weeks-- hardly, you can't have played for her every day-- to restore the Countess."

Julian swallows.

"Sing," Yennefer says. "I wish to hear it."

Instead he pauses in his melody-- she raises her head to look as he furrows his brows. "When I play it," he says, "everyone gets this far-away look in their eyes. On the mountain-- you remember the song, but--"

"But what?"

"You didn't move after. No one did, aside from Borch-- everyone was turned to me but their eyes--"

The sorceress lowers her hand to his elbow, squeezes lightly-- _reassuringly_ \-- and studies his face. "I thought you an incompetent trobairitz back on the mountain," she says, ignoring his indignant squawk. "I was wrong. I also thought myself the only one able to manipulate Chaos in a competent manner-- I was wrong there on two accounts. Borch _is_ Chaos, in the rawest sense, in _instinct,_ and he is old, wise, he has had Melitele knows how long to hone it, and on that count it is no wonder I sensed nothing."

"And _you_ , a mortal bard claimed by an ancient relic as soon as it fell to your hands, manipulating its Chaos so delicately without even knowing-- well, there was no way I could have forseen it. I was unguarded. I thought myself safe-- I still believe myself to be safe, not only because I have taken precaution but because I do not think you wish me any harm-- even if you do fear me. I do not make any mistake twice."

Julian blinks. "You said you were wrong--"

"Yes," she sighs. "Chaos is--"

" _No,_ " he says, and a grin works onto his face-- one of the likes she hadn't seen since the mountain. "You said you thought me an incompetent trobairitz, and then you said you were wrong--"

"Jaskier."

"Yennefer of Vengerburg, you _like_ my music--"

" _Bard,_ " the sorceress says, warningly.

Evidently he has no preservation instincts, because he merely leans closer-- "You think I'm _competent in my craft_ ," he says to which she shoves his arm with surprising strength, that which sends him stumbling just a bit.

Yennefer sighs, and says, "Your work is... _exaggerated_... but not, I suppose, the worst I have heard. Though I have not heard much by your mouth, only through others."

Beaming, Julian parts his lips-- just in time for the sorceress to thrust out her hand and send _something_ flying into his face, just as she had Zoltan ( who was presently glowering in the parlor on the floor below, as the Countess de Stael prattled on about prose, and unable to voice his disquiet ).

" _Not a word more of this._ "

He merely wheezes where words should be, then puts a hand to his throat at the horrid sensation of voicelessness and nods.

Satisfied with his compliance, the sorceress steps closer and presses a finger to his lips; she pulls her hand back, whatever she had hit him with-- inky, though vaporous-- follows closely and dissipates in the air between them. Julian coughs into his fist, then-- 

" _Fuck,_ " he sputters, eloquently-- Yennefer raises her brows-- " _Oh, Melitele's sweet tits,_ I hated that. I hated that a lot."

She rolls her eyes and moves toward the window, so he follows, pauses just behind her in time to watch as she shoves it open and braces herself against the sill-- he'd nearly forgotten it did that, only ever sat before it on account of his mother bustling in and yelling about the leaves that would fly in otherwise. Sometimes, on the rare occasions he would wake before anyone else, he'd crack it open to hear the birdsong.

"Does it mean something to you?" Yennefer asks.

"What?"

"This room," she says. "You keep her here, but don't stay. Why would you? Acting viscount, on top of that I know you have a taste for luxury. I assume you occupy the nicest room in this place."

"I do," he agrees. "I overtook my father's-- he moved to our country estate once I claimed my title."

"So?" She questions. _Does it mean something?_

"This was my bedroom, yearly until I was old enough to attend private schooling, then throughout winters and parts of spring growing up. Outside of it I was studying or attending some high-end event for my father's sake."

"And the oak?"

"What of it?"

"It's dead."

She turns to find him frowning, lute lowered by his side almost as if it were forgotten. "It was my mothers," he says. "Or it was supposed to be, anyhow. Once she passed my father must have requested it to be left untended for whatever reason, its been dead... I don't know how long. Growing up I would sit just here and listen for the warbler that lived in it."

"And?" She asks.

"And?" He echoes.

"It still stands."

"Yes," he agrees, _it means something._

Yennefer hums. "I am no druid," she says. "But I could come up with something, I'm sure, given a day or so."

He furrows his brows. "Why would you do that?"

"I'd like to ask something of you," the sorceress says, instead, as she pulls back from the windowsill. He's off put by the look in her eyes-- not that it's a _bad_ one, so to speak-- "Come with me."

"Pardon?" He huffs, incredulously.

Yennefer's mouth lilts, just a bit.

"Come with me."


	29. Julian and the Oak

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm trying to fix my sleep schedule and i've woken up consistently at 7am for the past two days like damn go me.

Jaskier supposes that if he were anyone else, the beetle black eyes schtick _would_ be rather off-putting. But he isn't anyone else, and he's unfortunately been very up close and personal with a _Grave Hag,_ and there's really nothing more off-putting than a beast with a maw stuffed full of rotted flesh drooling spittle on you and waving her sagging tits about-- so _no,_ he doesn't care that his best friend has returned with eyes blacker than the night. Nor does he think too hard about how the man bares his teeth at his touch ( How he's ready to burst. Moments away from gnashing his teeth. ).

He touches anyway; cups the man's face, thumbs over the crease in his brow.

"Tell me," he says. "Does it hurt?"

It _looks_ like it hurts, and Geralt has been gritting his teeth painfully since he stumbled back into their little camp ( whipping his head toward every rustle in the brush, flashing his slightly-too-pointed teeth at a particularly loud crackle of flame and then turning his gaze as if burned ). He recognizes it ( in an old friend, rocking in his seat-- " _Did you know--_ " pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose and smiling at the space just past his shoulder ) in the set of his shoulders and balling fists.

The Witcher merely grimaces. Jaskier frowns, presumably takes it as a yes.

In truth, Geralt muses to himself, it burns as if his sockets were stuffed with hot coals-- but its been so long. Too long to bother putting it into words, to start worrying now.

There is nothing the bard can do about their surroundings, or the burning of his sockets-- the leaves will rustle and the animals will bark and screech, stamp and howl. Geralt had prepared for a gruelling battle, hadn't expected to return until well into the morning-- instead it had lasted all of four hours and he could hear, see ( _taste, smell, feel_ ) everything. Too loud, too bright, too strong. He palms at his eyes. The creak of his mare's bones as she shifts her footing, the rustling of the bard's clothes against his skin and his breath as it passes his teeth.

"Come then," Jaskier says, and Geralt wants to say no. He'd like to _fight,_ to sink his teeth into something, to feel the searing in his muscles. He'd like to be alone. He'd like to stumble back into the woods and curl into himself beneath some tree, sink well beneath its roots and lose touch with everything.

Instead, he more or less falls into the bard and presses close-- then closer still, noses against his throat and breathes him in, feels his pulse against his mouth ( A grazing of lips against flesh-- he could _bite._ Humans-- no, _Jaskier_ is far too trusting. Sees good where there is not. Fragile. Weak. ) and hears his heart beat solidly in his chest. It isn't enough, not by a stretch, but it's something.

Jaskier's hand sinks into his hair, keeps him there, and the other covers his ear ( it doesn't quiet nearly enough but it dawns on him then that he's being _cared for_ , and he's much too old for that-- much too old for a lot of things-- but he holds tighter ), and the bard inhales--

\-- and he hums.

\--

"I can't," he says. "I can't, I have duties here, and you have no need of me, and--" he'd never learn, one day his mouth will get him into trouble ( it already has, his heart might attest ). "And you don't like me, besides. Never have. I can't rightly fathom why you've bothered to come."

Yennefer curls her lip, but the expression schools over quickly; morphs into something else ( regret, remorse, something so unlike her it gives him pause ), flashing so fleetingly he's unsure if he's imagined it. She turns back to the window and braces against it, tilts so far forward he worries she might just topple out.

"Jaskier," she sighs-- and he should correct her; he'd left that part behind him, hasn't put quill to parchment in over a month now, hasn't played for a proper audience much longer. Hasn't even tried since she found him in that decrepit tavern at the base of the mountain. He tightens his grip on his lute, cradles it against his middle, and something cold settles over him as she shifts. Their eyes meet-- and violet, quite frankly, clashes with cornflower blue. He looks away as she parts her lips, finding he doesn't want to hear whatever might slip from them-- how he's _right,_ how she was only here because she might've been able to gain something from him.

He mutters something, deaf even to his own ears, and turns on his heel.

\--

Virginia's husband returns from his stay at sea, and she leaves him.

_Again._

"You know I love you, Julian, but--"

"Do you?" He interrupts-- and he should stop, he should let it all be-- his throat feels rather tight, but he presses on, "I remember quite well what you said all those summers ago. _This is not love, Countess._ You were never a conquest. I'm beginning to think I was."

Virginia purses her lips, lifts her chin. He's never seen her smile and today is no different.

"Leave me," he says.

"Julian--"

" _Leave me._ "

She does.

\--

Cintra falls. Countless lives lost. A slaughter at the hands of a remorseless army. Royals corralled to mass suicide by their undying loyalty. He isn't there when it happens, yet he feels the weight of Calanthe's fall in his very bones.

The oak outside his window _thrives._ "It was the miracle woman," the gardener had said. "The fair sorceress, upon her return. Buried something in the soil."

When he looks in the mirror, his mother looks back. He supposes her eyes are just as dead in her grave as they were when she was alive.

Julian swallows and picks _himself_ up.

His doublet is looser than he remembers and his hair sits well past his ears ( and he really _should_ take a razor to his face, but right now he just needs to _go_ ), but Ettariel still sits snugly against his back.

It isn't until he's past the main gates to the estate that he realizes.

He's forgotten his bedroll.

He promptly turns back to collect it.

_Then_ he goes.


	30. Bouton d'Or ( the Bard )

In Toussiant, with naught but his satchel and lute strapped across his back, Julian pops a grape in his mouth and basks in the setting sun. From this point, seated at an outdoor tavern table just along the kingdom's outskirts, the vineyards are ablaze-- metaphorically, of course, drenched in dusk's ichor-- and the _castle,_ well, he's never seen anything like it.

"Straight from a fable, isn't it?" The barmaid sighs, beside him. He looks up and is immediately taken back by her wild curls, she blinks, owlishly, and offers a sheepish smile as he schools himself and pops another grape in his mouth. There's a broom gripped lightly in her hands; he's reminded of Sara, the _Pheasant's Inn_ inkeeper. Wonders what's befallen her and her child in all these years, whether he should visit the small village of Blackwater again. How old would the child be now?

"Your eyes," she says, rather suddenly. "They're--"

"Blue," he says, abruptly, blinking himself out of his reprieve. _Dull,_ he thinks. _Dead._ Though maybe he shouldn't have said anything at all, he hadn't _meant_ to be rude but his reply had fallen gruffly from his lips nonetheless. Maybe aging ( if not by looks, then by mind ) disagreed with him, although he wasn't _that_ old. Only just forty.

Her brows raise, almost challenging. "Stunning," she finishes. "Clearer than the skies on a cloudless summer afternoon."

Something in her voice-- maybe it's the accent, he'd always liked the way Common Speak lilted against a foreigner's tongue, but he isn't sure-- tugs a smile from his lips. He motions for her to join him, and she does. Falls gracefully on the bench beside him, settles with her legs crossed at the ankle and her hands folded neatly in her lap, she leans forward to catch his gaze. Something playful sits in her eyes.

"You are a foreigner," she says. It isn't a question, the statement is doused in thinly veiled curiosity.

Julian nods, reaches to pull another grape from the platter beside him. He holds it between two fingers and waves it-- the barmaid looks at him strangely, until he tosses it up and catches it in his teeth.

She smiles, eyes brightened by her unabashed delight. It's a pretty smile, he thinks, and something warms his chest at the sight of it. Maybe it's the glass or two ( or three ) of Beauclair wine he had earlier. More likely, it's his longing to put on a proper show ( but he just can't manage it, not yet ). He pops the fruit fully into his mouth.

"Where do you hail?" the woman goads. He hums, amused by the odd choice of wording.

"Does it matter?" He asks. "I don't intend to go back."

She cocks her brow. "You will stay in Toussaint?"

"No."

"You travel with a caravan?"

"No," he says again. "I play alone."

"You travel," she concludes. "By yourself."

"Something like it," he agrees.

She hums. Then, "You do not play for us?"

He rolls another grape between his fingers. "I could," he says. Not as he was, though. "Depending on if you know who I am."

There'd been many weeks of _trying,_ but he'd done his job as the Witcher's barker well. Far too well. It's all anyone saw in him anymore, and while he hadn't necessarily grown bitter by the recognition the incessant goading to sing Geralt's praises had begun to sit uneasily on his tongue. At this point he craved anonymity; the freedom to play _literally anything else,_ at least until he could get over his petty grievances.

It might be, more or less, why he found himself in Toussaint of all places.

The barmaid rearranges her skirts in her lap. "Depending of which way?" She asks.

"Jaskier," he says. It still feels funny on his tongue, but Julian feels far worse. Maybe if he keeps saying it, it will sit right with him again. He looks at the fruit in his palm. How many grapes can a man eat in one sitting? He pops this one in his mouth without another thought. "I am the bard Jaskier."

"I do not know it," the woman says, puzzled. "Is this good?"

Julian chuckles behind his hand, turns to look over the vineyards again, but the sun has settled beneath the horizon some time during their talk. It's too dark to see much besides the lighted castle and the city below it. The woman beside him shifts.

"I am Sylvia," she offers, after a moment. "It is good to meet you, Jaskier."

He turns to find her hand extended. Bemused, he reaches out and grasps it. "It is good to meet you too, Sylvia."

Her smile brightens-- the sun is gone now and he suspects it is somewhere behind her teeth, or maybe her eyes.

"What does it mean?" She questions.

_Jaskier,_ she means. Surprisingly, it isn't often that he is asked.

" _Bouton d'Or,_ " he hums, and she laughs, his pronunciation is sub-par at best but considering how long its been this doesn't surprise him. She doesn't seem to mind, in any case, only keeps beaming at him. It makes his heart do something funny in his chest.

" _Enchanté de faire votre connaissance, Bouton d'Or._ " _Pleased to meet you, Buttercup._ It is true still that he thought her accent pleasing, but immediately he finds this is _much_ better.

" _Enchantée, moi aussi._ " _Pleased to meet you, too._

" _Je_ _ne savais pas que tu parlais ma langue maternelle._ " _I did not know that you spoke my mother tongue._ Sylvia's eyes are as warm as the fingers that continue to brush against the back of his palm. This feeling _must_ be the wine.

He swallows, finds himself wanting to continue speaking, if only so that she will, but isn't sure how much he can. " _Seulement un peu._ " _Just a little bit._

" _Vous le parlez_ _assez bien,_ " she says. _You speak it well enough._

Despite her assurance, he's almost positive that he doesn't. The accent doesn't sit well past his lips. " _Un peu,_ " he repeats. _A little._

" _Peux-tu jouer pour moi?_ " She asks, slipping her hand from his to point at Ettariel. "Will you play for me, _Bouton d'Or?_ I did not know of you."

Maybe he's under some spell. He almost frowns at the loss of contact, or maybe he _does,_ because she giggles. The flush rises to his cheeks unbidden, so he reaches for his case-- better to play than be scrutinized in such a state, not that she seems to mind, and in any case she's right. She hadn't known who he was, that gives him freedom to play what he desires-- for an _audience,_ even if it's just one lone barmaid in the night-- and that isn't an opportunity he will ever be likely to pass up.

He meets her gaze as his fingers settle against the strings and she nods expectantly, excitedly, and he grins.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> anyone; * speaks foreign language *
> 
> jaskier; that is the most attractive thing i have ever witnessed in my life holy shi--


	31. Julian and the Duchess

The city of Beauclair is just as spectacular up close as it is from a distance, and Sylvia was right-- it _is_ something straight from a fable. He'd spent all of three months here, once he'd realized he could make a name for himself ( again ) without a brush of his past.

He'd fallen in love.

A chance encounter ( maybe something more, something that tasted like destiny-- or sweet Beauclair wine ) at the kingdom's foothills, a Duchess atop a fair steed touring the tourney ground outskirts and a bard on foot singing only for the trees. Her mare slows from a canter beside him, he glances up-- it was love at first sight, or something like it.

Two months.

It lasted two entire months, the closest he'd ever come to settling down, before Duke Raymond returned from sea, learned of their escapades ( to an extent ) by blabbering servants and had Duchess Anna Henrietta locked away in her rooms. And Julian might be eccentric, he might be gaudy and blindingly optimistic, but he isn't _stupid,_ so he _runs._

Then the Duke learns his name-- it was only a matter of time, and he can't fault her for it-- and orders him killed; or, more accurately, orders his heart to be carved out so that he might feed it to Anna before their court. So he runs some more.

Despite this, he can't quite seem to run fast enough. He's reached the outskirts, finally, despite his slight detour ( couldn't help himself, couldn't leave without bidding Sylvia adieu ), when a knight had happened upon him by _chance_ and thought to give chase-- and _thank Melitele_ for that armour, or he'd have been caught paces ago.

In any case, his muscles burned almost as bad as his lungs, the clanking of a knight frantically pounding through the dirt was getting devastatingly close ( or maybe his mind is playing tricks on him ) and he passes a horse ( oh, if only he had a horse ) and then the _horse_ passes him, and-- _wait, what?_

" _Jaskier,_ " its rider grits.

Julian spares little more than a glance before throwing himself at the steed, and he doesn't know how he knows that the rider will catch him but he _does,_ and he's swung onto the back of the saddle effortlessly. He can do little more than gasp for breath, slump against the man's back and wave urgently, but luckily the message gets across. The vineyards pass by in a sickening blur, though he isn't sure if it's due to their pace or if the adrenaline is wearing off.

Neither of them say anything, though he does finally catch his breath, until they are far enough away from the errant knight that they can stop. The bard pushes himself from the saddle haphazardly, almost doesn't catch himself, " _Melitele's tits._ "

"Hmm."

As Julian stumbles into their little haven, a sad excuse for a thicket of trees, with Ettariel clutched to his chest, and drops himself at one of their bases in his exhaustion, Geralt of Rivia dismounts from his steed. The bard closes his eyes and thunks his head back against the tree.

There's shuffling ( deliberate, Geralt wasn't known to make noise unless he wanted his presence to be known ), and then the Witcher joins him at his side. "What did you do?" He questions. It's stifling in a way he's unaccustomed to, tense, at least to himself-- he peeks, just for a moment. Tense in general.

This isn't how he'd imagined them meeting again, if at all. The man can't just waltz back into his life and _demand--_

"Jaskier." _Speak._

He huffs, instead. "Julian."

"No," the Witcher says.

It's pathetic, really, that all it takes for him to breathe again ( _really_ breathe, for the first time in _eons_ ) is for Geralt to outright deny him his anguish. He's not going to cry here. He'll save that for when they part again.

He's lost his first, truest love and fallen right into the arms of his oldest and truest friend ( nevermind the fact that they weren't actually friends, nor had he fallen into his arms, _nor_ that he had been pining after this man for the majority of his early adult hood-- ).

Maybe he would cry here. It's not as if Geralt would care, if anything it might make him leave sooner. Before it can hurt worse than he already knows it will, just by seeing him again. He sets Ettariel aside gingerly and pulls his knees to his chest.

"Jaskier," the Witcher says again.

( -- he never really stopped. )

Jaskier chuckles wetly, incredulously, and then begins to outright _sob._ For Anna Henrietta ( the love as sweet as Beauclair wine ), for Kerack ( the home that was never his ), for his very best friend ( who he could do nothing right for, as hard as he tried, and look at him _now,_ messing it all up _again_ ).

It isn't pretty, crying hardly ever is, but Geralt sits beside him for gods-only-know how long through the worst of it, looking torn between wanting to give comfort and wanting to run for the hills. In the end it's the former; once he's gathered himself enough to properly breathe and wipe at his tears, the Witcher's hand settles firmly-- but not unpleasantly-- against his shoulder. Jaskier spares a glance, and he must look a wreck, but he isn't prepared for the unabashed concern lining the man's features-- isn't prepared to acknowledge it, in any case.

"Cintra," the bard says instead, because his priorities are clearly muddled, "is--"

"Yes." Geralt's hand rises some, brush his jaw just barely. He tilts his face away, the Witcher pulls back. "I rode into Cintra well before," he says. "To claim the child."

"And?"

"Calanthe tried to give me another." He scrunches up his nose distastefully and it piques Jaskier's interest, as he's never seen him do it before. "Then she had me thrown in the dungeons."

The bard snorts. "Of course she did."

"She-- the child survived the battle, though I don't know how. Found her in the forrest a ways off from Sodden."

"Cirilla is strong," Jaskier says. "Like Calanthe, in many ways. Like you."

Geralt searches his face. "You know her."

"Of course I know her," he huffs. "One of us had to check up on her, and it wasn't going to be _you,_ with how you steadfastly refused to acknowledge her."

"You never told me."

"You would have told me not to return."

"Hmm."

_Hmm,_ the Witcher says. Short for a lot of things. In this instance, short for, _You're right, Jaskier, you know me better than I know myself,_ to which he would then reply, _Yes, Geralt, I very much do._

"She is in Aretuza with Yennefer, we hope that the sorceress will be able to help her assume better control of her power."

"You've made up, then?"

Geralt huffs. "No."

Jaskier raises a brow. Then, "She's gone mad, you know."

The Witcher blinks.

"After--" he waves a hand, _after the mountain, after everything--_ "She visited me at my family estate, just once."

"Why?"

"I don't know," the bard finds himself admitting. "I had the strangest feeling that she was there for my _company._ It was strangely intimate--"

"You slept with her," Geralt says.

Jaskier blanches. "I absolutely did _not,_ you blathering arse. She's taken to cupping my face, tidying my hair, _crooning at me._ She even asked me to leave with her-- I said no."

"Oh," Geralt says, almost sheepishly and wholly puzzled.

There is a moment of quiet-- or disquiet, perhaps-- before the Witcher speaks again.

"We--"

" _We?_ " Jaskier scoffs.

Another moment of silence. The bard tugs at his collar, picks at his nails.

"What happened in Toussaint?" Geralt asks again.

Jaskier rests his chin upon his knees. " _I fell in love_ ," he sighs, disdainfully.


	32. Jaskier and The Dandelions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ceo of writing way more than i intend to when i start

They've commandeered the hall for themselves; his voice reverberates against the stone, settling something in his stomach that he can't put a name to ( Has he ever before filled a room with his voice alone? Much less a _hall_ as grandiose as this? ) and mulls sweetly in the air as they sway. She embraces him unabashedly, arms thrown loosely around his neck and his hands in turn linger at her waist-- Ettariel sits on one of the marble benches, soaking in the music. He can feel her pull just around the bend, lilts toward it ( his lover smiles sweetly and guides him gently back to the center ). If he listens closely, he thinks he can hear a single note permeate the air, almost as if the instrument sings with him.

Almost. Despite Yennefer's assurances he hasn't ruled out that he might just be crazy.

She brings her hands to his face, looks at him like he's hung the stars, clings dearly to each and every word even if she can't grasp its meaning. He turns her and she laughs, tilts her head back just-so; caught by a beam of light from the high windows as she slips from his grasp, arms thrown wide and skirts sweeping broadly past her ankles, she glows. There is a moment where he struggles to meet a note, too taken by the sight before him ( and he's almost ashamed, he's far too practiced to make such mistakes ), but the room carries him--

At his side, Geralt stirs. She fades from his vision like a dream. "Who was she?" 

Jaskier twirls a dandelion between his thumb and forefinger. "Her Enlightened Ladyship," he says, pitifully, "Duchess--"

"Jaskier."

"You believe I've strung up some elaborate falsehood?" He snaps, though he doesn't mean to-- maybe age _has_ bittered him. Maybe circumstance. "I apologize," the bard amends, "but I have never lied to you before. Even if I had, you'd smell it."

"Hear it," the Witcher corrects, idly. "You're right." _I'm sorry._ It isn't enough, but it's a start.

"Duke Raymond ordered my heart carved out," he continues. "To be served on a platter for my lover to feast upon. His knights pursue me, though count me lucky, I suppose, that they hate him as much as they adore Anna-- they won't make chase unless they are bound by witness."

"All in a season?" Geralt muses.

"Give or take."

"Isn't that-"

"Too soon?" The bard huffs. "You're one to talk, could hardly keep your prick in your trousers around Yennefer."

Geralt shifts, then-- affronted, maybe-- and rises. "We weren't in love. Aren't," he says.

Jaskier hums, bends the dandelion's stem and reaches for another. " _You_ were. It was plain as day, my--" _my dear old friend._ He clears his throat. "Plain as day."

"It wasn't," the Witcher insists. He lingers, looms almost precariously ( hesitantly, certainly out of his depth ), adjusts the bit of hardened leather strapped to his forearm. "Because I wasn't. But you were?"

He knots the stems together and reaches for a third to add to the chain. "Geralt," he says, honestly surprised they've gotten even this far. "Don't feign blindness. I fall in love with everything."

"Everything."

"Everyone. All the time." _Hard._

They fall quiet, then Geralt moves ( _finally_ ) to tend to Roach, leaving him to his little dandelion chain. Funny, he thinks, how they grow where you least expect them, like this sorry little thicket.

_They're weeds,_ Geralt would say, had he voiced this. _That's what they do._

_You're a weed,_ he'd mutter in turn. He picks another.

The bard hums as he finishes his piece, a circlet of dandelions just big enough to sit askance atop his unruly head; thinks he should probably _stop_ thinking of what Geralt _might_ say while the man is beside him-- though it wasn't so far-fetched. There'd been many times when, in rather poor circumstance, he'd been found by his then-companion on the Path as if he'd turned up in a puff of smoke. Much like today, really. He'd call it destiny, if the Witcher believed in such a thing.

The silence breaks by a snap and a crackle of flame, Geralt using his magicks, presumably-- _igni_ , if he recalls correctly-- to set the kindling alight. "You're quiet," the Witcher mumbles.

"Just thinking," he manages.

"About?"

Jaskier wrinkles his nose. "Missed my blathering, have we?"

Geralt prods a bit of the kindling with the toe of his boot, guiding it further towards the flame. "Yes," he says.

"Oh." The bard, staring resolutely into the dirt, shifts again against his tree. 

"Jaskier--"

"Feeling chatty?" He interjects, reaching up to straighten his lilting crown and finally peer up. _For once,_ he thinks. The man wants to talk _now,_ of all times.

" _Jas_ ," the Witcher grumbles-- he's almost startled by the man's closeness, crouching beside him and fiddling almost anxiously with the strap of his arm piece. It's strange, he's never seen Geralt on edge like _this_ before, and with a bitterness of a sort that he hadn't known he harbored, as he takes in his face, realises the man has _aged_. "I--"

_Geralt_ aging before _him;_ its been hardly over a year-- "Not now," he pleads, quietly-- but he supposes the man had well over a decade to make up for, now that he wasn't there. Something hardens in his throat, by the darkened circles beneath the man's eyes; by the more prominent creases upon his brow, the--

"You haven't changed," the Witcher hums, instead. It seems their minds were running along the same train of thought.

"She keeps me young," he says, and Geralt must remember because his gaze flickers immediately to Ettariel beside him. "Not a curse," he reassures. "Yennefer looked over her. It's in her interest to keep me young, it seems."

Geralt nods. "Repayment."

"For a song or two."

"Or three," the Witcher says. "Or four. You'd play the same song for the better part of an hour before I stopped you, sometimes."

Jaskier furrows his brows. "Did I?"

Geralt hums, then shifts to sit on the dirt before him. "Yes. Mumbling under your breath about the tune being wrong every other minute, just to play it again."

"Ah," he says. "That would be her favorite."

"You played it on the mountain," Geralt continues. "With words I couldn't place."

"Yes," he says, because agreeing seems his safest bet. "I apologize. It was a call to attention of sorts, Borch helped me snap everyone out of it."

"I didn't mean for you to apologize." The Witcher fiddles with his strap again. "I knew it was magic, by then. But it was yours, and nothing you could do is malicious. I went willingly."

Jaskier frowns. "Geralt--"

"I did miss it. Your... _blathering_ , as it were. The sounds of your instrument and your footsteps beside me. I didn't--"

" _Geralt_ ," he says again.

"I shouldn't have said what I did," the man insists, "on the mountain. I knew it was wrong, I knew you well enough to lash out where it would hurt and I took advantage because _I_ was hurting, and--"

"That--"

"Isn't an excuse," Geralt huffs, shifting his gaze abruptly to their fire. For once, their rolls were reversed and Jaskier found himself unable to get a word in edgewise. "There is no excusing my behavior that night. I don't expect you to forgive me, I don't expect that I can fix this with just my word, but I need you to know that I meant none of it. I was arguing for the sake of arguing. It was a near mindless lashing. The weight of my words hit me as soon as I calmed enough to turn and find you gone."

"You're a fool," he says, abruptly. "And a cad, and-- and a plethora of _many_ other unpleasant things. You never even went after me--"

"I thought to give you space," the Witcher says, solemnly. "And then the war was on the rise, and--"

"Even after you found the girl," he points out. "You didn't come for me."

"You were nowhere!" Geralt argues, throwing a twig to the flame petulantly. "None had seen you play in months, I'd begun to fear you _died--_ "

"I went home," Jaskier sighs. "And you don't know my full name, much less my title."

"-- and then I heard a bard by the name Jaskier had popped up in Toussaint, of all places," he finishes.

"And you came to find me," he concludes. "And you did, just before I could get skewered. I was wondering what you were doing so far south, I thought contracts, maybe--"

"Witchers rarely venture so far south, Toussaint is a plethora of higher vampires masquerading as--" the man shrugs-- "as whatever you might come up with. Between them and the knights of the Duchy, contracts are few and far between."

"And you all just let them be?" He questions, incredulously.

Geralt nods once, then tears his gaze from the flame to look back to the bard. "They are men," he says. "Differ only in their lifespan and prowess, only revealing themselves when it suits them. Often times they don't even drink blood, and if they do it's a substitute to men-- cattle, perhaps-- just enough to get them drunk."

Jaskier palms at his eyes, allows Geralt's words to wash over him and wonders vaguely whether he'd happened upon one in the months he remained there without even knowing-- then he lowers his hands and blinks in recognition.

"You're still apologizing," the bard says, not unkindly. Geralt hadn't complained once, about anything, since they reunited ( aside from his uncharacteristic quietness, which was more than understandable ).

The Witcher fiddles with his strap again. "Hmm."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i just wanna say i read all your comments and they always make my heart go absolutely buck wild and i want so badly to reply but i'm so lame and awkward and even though i can write all this in one sitting i can't come up with a single good response to show my gratitude so rip haha shi--


	33. Julian and Not

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> another one? so soon? what can i say, i too am invested

It was easy to fall into step beside Geralt-- well, _Roach_ , really-- the following morning, almost as if no time has passed-- but time _has_ passed, and as much as Jaskier's fingers _ache_ to press against Ettariel's strings he can't manage it. Instead he keeps pace at the mare's shoulder, fingers teasing at the ends of her mane. Quietly.

He thinks of Anna. Of her delicate hands cupping his cheeks, her soft lips pressing a kiss to his brow and another to the corner of his mouth. Hears his own voice reverberating against stone walls. It's easy to ignore the dread of departure by envisioning her in front of him.

The only noise here comes from Roach's hooves against the path, the wind through the trees, the birds-- it isn't enough. He's itching to break it and he knows Geralt is, too. It creeps up like a spider on a signpost; he touches his throat, coughs once in hopes of clearing it. The feeling doesn't leave him, he fears for a moment that it might close up-- he brings his free hand up as he squeezes his eyes shut.

He trips then, of course, and Geralt catches him-- fingers snagging the collar of his doublet, curling into the fabric. Still, even as he steadies, he doesn't open his eyes.

The trio comes to a halt unanimously. Geralt must sense something, because his grip lingers.

"Jaskier," he says. The bard finds himself unable to place the tone.

His eyes open. Something wet and warm meets his upper lip and, blearily, he swipes at it. When he looks, he's met with the sight of blood. Something shifts-- it's his other hand, slipping from Roach's mane; he inspects it, but it isn't marred red like the other.

More blood drips from his nose, so he wipes at it again-- and that'll do it, yes, both hands are adequately stained.

"-- _ier_..."

He reaches to steady himself, then thinks better of getting his blood on Roach's coat and instead looks up. The saddle is empty, but he finds himself unable to recall her rider's dismount. He blinks-- someone touches his face, and he thinks of Anna, with her delicate hands, guiding him to the center of the hall; and he grasps their wrist before he can think better of it and turns to look.

_Ah,_ he thinks, belatedly. _There you are._

His freed hand rises to meet the stubble adorning his Witcher's face-- he's startled to see red where his fingers depart. He remembers his hands. He blinks--

Julian sits at his desk, in the largest Oxenfurt lecture hall, and only tears his gaze from the peeling wallpaper because he hears something faintly shatter. At his feet sits teacup. It is whole.

_Peculiar,_ he thinks. He could've sworn--

When he looks back up, it's to find himself staring back-- he startles, but settles once he realizes it's only his reflection.

Then he hears it again. His gaze slips downward, yet the teacup still sits whole at his feet.

Something warm and wet touches his upper lip. When he looks up, it is to a shattered mirror and a warped reflection peering much too closely with a much too deadened gaze.

Not-Julian wipes at the blood dripping from his own nose, effectively smearing it. _It's no use,_ he thinks. _You've already stained your collar-- and your hands._

Not-Julian lifts his hand again, brings it to his throat-- 

Julian sucks in a breath, then another, and another-- the air won't stay in his lungs long enough to offer any sort of reprieve. He lifts his own hand, something works its way up his throat. He coughs, or _tries_ to, but it hurts and relieves nothing.

Not-Julian falls to his knees. For a moment his face is obscured by the mirror's backing, and then he disappears entirely beneath the desks edge.

The mirror falls. Julian hears it splinter against the lecture hall floor--

" _Jaskier._ "

The _something_ in his throat shifts, and he lurches so violently that he finds himself bracing against his desk. He coughs again. _Again. Again._ Something passes from his lips into his hand, a clump doused in blood.

Buttercups.

" _Jaskier._ "

Someone touches his face. He blinks.

" _Jaskier._ "

A hand grips the far edge of his desk. Not-Julian struggles to bring himself to his knees--

" _Jaskier!_ "

They both startle. Not-Julian nearly falls back to the floor.

"You're Not-Julian," he says. "Not me."

Julian sputters, manages to suck in enough air to spill out a strangled, "What?"

"You're Not-Julian," he says again. "I am. You're not Julian. You're--"

" _Jaskier--_ "

Jaskier blinks again, hard. Julian continues to struggle to his feet, but the closer he gets the worse he fares-- his knuckles split, bruises mar most of his exposed flesh, his nose all but pours blood.

"Stop it," Jaskier says. _Stop it. Sit. Nurse your wounds. You never know when enough's enough, you never know when to stop--_

_"A fifth because you never learn--"_

_"Silly Julian--"_

_"Rotten child--"_

_"Jaskier!"_

His eyes flutter open-- he hadn't even realized they'd been closed-- as he gasps for breath. Geralt cups his face firmly, at the same time keeps him upright where they kneel in the dirt. Roach whinnies beside them. There's a splotch of red against the Witcher's jaw.

"I'm sorry," he sputters. "Your face--" He reaches up, but catches sight of his hand and thinks better of it. _Don't cry. Don't cry._ Geralt hushes him, but the tears rise unbidden-- they've never listened before, why would they now?

"Jaskier," Geralt says again. The witcher thumbs away his tears as he tries very hard to gather his breath. It strikes him again how much the man has aged in a year; he wants so badly to touch, to _fix_ it. "You're here," the man says. "You've come back to me."

Geralt pulls him closer, tucks him into his chest, blood and all-- he's fallen straight from the arms of his lover into the arms of another ( Would-be, in any case. If he was a decade or so younger, if the man would've had him ).

"I think," he mumbles-- the man only holds him tighter. "I think we came back to each other."

Geralt _did_ come to find him, in the end, and maybe he hadn't been searching, but he _had_ been running in the right direction.

Curling into his chest feels something like destiny's shrouded puzzle falling into place-- or would, if Geralt believed in that sort of thing. He's not sure he can bring himself to forgive the other just yet, but he licks his lips and swears he tastes something like a fine Beauclair wine. Or maybe blood.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you again for the comments ( be still my beating heart, i fall a little bit in love with every one of you )


	34. Fair Ettariel and Her Companion, Bard

Jaskier promptly shoves out of Geralt's hold-- and the man lets him, which he is grateful for, because in the time it takes for him to turn bile rises up his throat and he retches into the dirt. Despite it all, he's relieved to see that it's _only_ bile ( not wilted flowers, not blood ). He breathes in deeply.

His hand comes up to wipe at his nose again; it's still dripping, though not as viciously as before. As he wipes his bloodied hand on his chemise-- it's already ruined, no point in sparing it now-- he tries to recall the last time this happened. Years ago. Eons. " _Silly Julian,_ " he blinks and suddenly is not where he left himself-- he's covered in blood and he fears he might've done the worst, but when he manages to stumble back he finds her safe. The blood is his. He can't help but feel relieved.

Again, at the mage's tower, the Witcher leaves ( _abandons_ ) him for a woman who used them both ( used _him,_ planned to use Jaskier, as well, for his wish ). Far less blood, but he blinks and when he comes back to himself the surroundings are unfamiliar. Geralt finds him anyways-- " _You want to leave us._ "

Again before a mirror, as the Witcher tends to his wounds; again at a tavern at the foot of a mountain-- far less blood, far less wandering--

Geralt's palm settles between his shoulders, hesitant. "Speak," the man compels. _Stop thinking so harshly._

"Apologies," he croaks.

Dissatisfied, Geralt shifts. They still kneel in the dirt, and at the reminder he begins to feel it acutely ( they must've been there for a while ).

"There is nothing to forgive," the Witcher says, albeit gruffly. Then, "Do you hear voices?"

Jaskier huffs-- "Do I what?"

"Voices. Things that tell you what to do--" _Rotten child._ "Spirits--" _You must be mad._ "Old gods--"

"No," he interrupts, shaking his head once. "Not in the way I believe you mean."

Geralt hums, slips his hand higher, and pulls him back into his chest. It's such a blatant show of affection that Jaskier startles-- and then the man _smells him,_ and he realizes it isn't _affection,_ he's trying to puzzle something out. Something turns unpleasantly in his gut.

"Nothing outwardly malicious?" The man continues. "Nothing that tells you to harm yourself?"

"What?" He says, again. "No--"

"Good," the Witcher says, then seems to think better of it. "No. Not good-- but, _good--_ "

Jaskier fumbles out of his grasp ( _again_ ), although this time he doesn't get sick. He merely peers up and wrinkles his nose. "What on Melitele's good earth are you on about, you mad man?"

Geralt blinks. "I thought, maybe-- but it isn't, I only worried it was." He pauses at the bard's expression. "I feared it was a Hym," he finishes.

If he didn't know better, he'd say the man was rattled by the thought.

"A what?" He offers.

"No," Geralt says. "Er-- I only mean-- It was a foolish thought. I've never seen you..." _Never that bad._ "And it was the only plausible conclusion-- Though of course there are better, if I had given more thought-- Not that anything is _better--_ "

Without thinking he reaches forward to press his palm to Geralt's chest; it's surprisingly effective at shutting him up, which he's grateful for because, reluctant as he is to admit it, his head feels as though it's stuffed with cotton. He tries to blink the feeling away to no avail-- Geralt must think he's slipping back under, a reasonable assumption, because he grabs his face lightly.

The man furrows his brows, the barest throw of concern. "Jaskier?"

"I'm still here, my--" _my dear friend._ He tries to pull his hand back but finds it won't listen to him. "My head is... cloudy, is all."

Geralt frowns.

"Still here," he tries again. "Reasonably. You worry too much-- I'll be fine in a moment, talking helps, actually, and I'm good at that. Hear me, Geralt? Still in the present, stop fussing."

The Witcher continues to scrutinize him, then, all at once, lifts them both-- him from under the arms-- much to his chargin. Jaskier curls his fingers around one of Geralt's many straps, adjusting both to the wave of nausea at the impromptu jostling and the suddenness of his feet under him, even as the man keeps him steady.

"Ugh," he says, rather eloquently.

Then, much to his dismay, Geralt takes him by the hips and lifts him _again--_ right into Roach's saddle. Suddenly he isn't sure he's woken up at all.

"Play us a song," Geralt says, urging his mare into motion.

The bard sways precariously for a moment, but in the end finds his balance easily enough. "A song?" He asks, unused to him making such requests. "What song? And what are we doing? I'm not allowed on Roach."

"Any song," Geralt goads. "You need stimulation. Walking is mindless, so you ride. Play."

"Oh," Jaskier says. "Buy me dinner first, at least."

"I have," the man retorts. "Many, many times."

_True enough,_ he thinks, and brings Ettariel to his front with practiced ease. He fiddles a moment with her keys-- not that she needs any tuning, she never has. Something washes over him at the first touch to her strings, as always; like sinking near frozen limbs into a hot bath, like--

Jaskier shifts against the mare's saddle in a valiant effort to get comfortable while also remaining upright. It doesn't quite work, but he settles well enough.

"To adore you is all my life," the bard begins.

"Fair Ettariel

Let me keep, then, the treasure of memories

And enchanted flower;

A pledge and sign of your love."

Geralt hums a resounding "Hmm," from below-- not altogether surprising, but _that's_ a thought, isn't it? The Witcher _below_ him. He spares a glance as the verse comes to a close.

"Silvered by drops of dew as if by tears..."

He isn't really expecting to meet the man's gaze but that's exactly what happens because he finds that Geralt is staring rather attentively. In hindsight it shouldn't rattle him as much as it does, but he practically snaps his gaze back to the path.

"Only one verse," the Witcher observes.

Jaskier nods faintly. "The original scripture is in Elder, _Ettariel the Fair,_ or, rather, in its mother tongue, _Elaine Ettariel._ I happened across it some way or another by a patron in some backwater town. Decrepit. Three-quarters of a page and ink so smudged it was hardly legible, and I'm by no means fluent--" Except, well, he kind-of was with Ettariel at hand. "But I made do, translated what I could."

"Do you--"

"Have the original script memorized?" He interrupts, coyly. "Yes, I do. Would you like to hear it?"

"Memorized?" The Witcher muses. Then, after a moment, "Yes."

Jaskier blinks and chances another glance-- Geralt continues his staring, he can't tell whether it's out of concern for whether he might fall or he's actually showing interest. Must be the former, but he'll pretend, just for a moment, before they reach the next town and finally part ways again-- because if they are to part ways, and he's certain Geralt will be itching to once his ego has mended, he'd like to leave at least with the thought that his art was appreciated.

"Yes," he echoes, a bit late. "Right, a-okay. It begins like this--"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yall; noice
> 
> me, socially stunted and feeling a weird but good achey feeling in my heart at the barest of praises; shdhsjnsnsn


	35. Ettariel's Strenuous Handoffs

Jaskier shifts again for the third time in ten minutes and he can see the way Geralt's grip tightens around Roach's reigns in response.

"Geralt, my Witchery... Witcher," he says. "I do very much love Roach, with my whole heart, and I am ever so grateful--"

Said Witcher interrupts with a terse, "How long have we been together?"

The bard's mouth snaps shut. He tries not to give too much thought to the phrasing, instead shifting again. _How long? Before the mountain, or are we pretending it never happened? Does this count too?_

"Its been nearly nineteen years since Posada," he says, instead of guessing. "Will be, come next midsummer--"

He is interruped again.

"Nineteen years of your groveling--" Jaskier scoffs, because he doesn't _grovel,_ but Geralt only meets his eyes and continues-- "Begging and whining to ride, and yet when you _finally_ get it you beg to be set off."

If Jaskier didn't have nearly as big of a heart as he did, he would've considered having a swing at the man with his lute.

( But he would never do such a thing, not to his fair Ettariel. )

"You can hardly blame me!" He argues. "I've gotten used to walking over the last two decades, thanks to _you,_ so a saddle is quite the discomfort now; and besides that I'm absolutely _filthy_ \-- the blood on my collar and the front of my chemise is sticking to my skin, I don't even _want_ to know what my face looks like-- the knees of my trousers are dirtied to the likes of which--"

"Bard."

"Don't _'Bard,'_ me, Geralt," Jaskier bristles, waving his arms about. Geralt quiets enough to observe his dramatics attentively, likely to be sure that he doesn't wave himself right out of his seat. "I want a _bath._ A warm inn, fine company-- and then _finer_ company, and--"

"A stream," Geralt says, suddenly. "We're a day or so off from the next village at this pace, but I can find you a stream if you'd like."

A _stream_ is nowhere near a _bath,_ but it is better than suffering this grime for another day-- if nothing else he'll be able to scrape off the majority and leave feeling fresher than he has in days. On top of that, he supposes it's best that he washes up _before_ they reach civilization; no village will take well to a bloodied bard following behind a Witcher, he's no doubt they'd misconstrue everything.

"I would," he says, eventually, and Geralt inclines his head as he takes heed-- it's strange to meet the man's gaze in this state; like a dog attuning to a strange noise. Staring, but not quite-- he supposes that he must look the about the same when he loses himself. The longer he looks, the looser his chest feels-- he's pleasantly surprised to find that, only after some hours of playing, the creases lining Geralt's face have eased just a smidge. "Like that, I mean," he finishes. "Are you quite alright?"

"I'm finding you a stream," he says, simply; and he must've done so, with his benevolent Witchery-ness, because in the next moment he turns and guides Roach gently off the path. Bewildered, Jaskier tilts forward-- hands firmly around the saddle's horn so that he might stay in place-- in an outlandish attempt to reclaim the man's gaze.

"You mean to say we are actively detouring?" The bard questions.

It works about as well as he thought it would; Geralt flickers his gaze over him and then back to the foliage-- not that there's much of it, up until the reach the base of the northward mountains-- without deigning him with a response.

He tries again-- "Where are you going after this?"

"Hmm."

"Ah," he says. "Yes, the great kingdom of ' _Hmm_ ,' I'm sure they've quite a--"

Geralt does look up at him now, brows furrowed. "After what?"

Jaskier blinks. "What?"

"After what?" He repeats. "You asked where I was going after ' _this_.' What is it I'm doing?"

"Dropping me off?" The bard questions. Hadn't that been the plan? To drop him off at the nearest inn after making amends and then trot off on his own without the burden of guilt blanketing him?

Geralt's face does this peculiar thing where it goes from confused to disappointed, then from disappointed to resigned, so openly that it almost leaves him reeling. "You have somewhere to be?"

"Geralt," he says. Then, fantastically confused, "No."

The Witcher sets his jaw and turns forward again. "You are speaking in tongues, Bard."

"I am not," says the bard. "You're just being confusing-- I thought you were meant to drop me off--"

"Where?" Geralt says. "I don't remember us discussing anything of the sort."

Jaskier swallows thickly, then sets himself upright as he should be. "Because we didn't, I--"

"I'm supposed to bring you somewhere you don't have to be, without knowing where it is?" The Witcher snarks.

Jaskier, being both the overgrown child he is and simultaneously having nothing to throw, kicks petulantly at Geralt's shoulder from where he sits with enough force to give the man pause. The man brushes off his shoulder and looks up again.

"Why."

"Because!" He exclaims. "You're both confusing and interrupting me! I meant only that I was under the impression that you would be rid of me at the next village--"

"Why--"

" _Hush,_ Geralt! We are talking over this reasonably--" he pauses, only long enough to pull Ettariel over his head and lift her-- " _I_ have the talky lute, you will not interrupt."

To his credit, Geralt shuts his mouth. Whether this is because he was following direction or because he was horribly confused by the phrase _talky lute_ is, however, unclear. Jaskier, confident at the very least that he's got his point across, sets Ettariel back in his lap.

"Firstly," the bard says, "you are being both abhorrently _nice_ and very _talky,_ and it is throwing me off because you were neither of those things before the mountain. In any case; it would be nice, these things, if it were time for such niceties, but--"

"Jaskier," Geralt frowns, completely ignoring the point of the talky lute.

"You hurt my feelings, Geralt," Jaskier continues, already forgiving the man's transgressions. "Tossed two decades back in my face like it was _nothing_ , and I-- you _know_ I'll forgive you. I always was going to, because you were hurting and never before have you been so needlessly cruel. But you never came back. I thought, when you apologized, it was so that when you left me again you wouldn't feel so guilty about it." 

It's probably the most he's spewed in one sitting in a while, and all at once he's sorry and not sorry at all for spilling so much so quickly. Geralt, however, brings his mare to a stop so that he might free his hands enough for the bard to deposit his lute into them. He still looks as bewildered as a stoic Witcher can manage, and he's holding her awkwardly in too-big hands, but Jaskier takes some comfort in the man's effort.

"I don't understand why the instrument should have authority over my voice," he says, and with that passes it back.

The bard blinks, aforementioned comfort waining as he stares at his instrument. "It teaches you to wait your turn," he says, simply.

Geralt frowns but offers his hands again, so he turns it over.

"I didn't," says the Witcher, after a moment. "There was no thought of abandoning you at the nearest tavern, I assumed you would follow."

Jaskier extends a hand, waits for Ettariel's neck to sit firmly in his grip, frowns and begrudgingly admits, "You assume correctly. I would have, had you asked."

Geralt takes her again, and it strikes the bard suddenly how silly the situation is-- the big, scary White Wolf cradling his prized possession with a touch so delicate it couldn't even break a butterfly's wing; taking the prospect of the 'talky lute' so seriously that he waits until his grip has fallen completely to speak.

"So you have nowhere to be," the Witcher confirms. "And I did not ask you to leave. So you will stay?"

Jaskier can't quite keep the smile off his face as he pulls Ettariel back. "Yeah," he says. "Yes. I'll stay... Er-- enough lute time, you may speak freely."

"Hmm," Geralt says.

"Ah, yes, the kingdom of ' _Hmm--'_ "

"Shut it, Bard."

"We _are_ still headed for the stream, right? I really would like to scrub myself off. As much as I can in a stream, anyways."

"Few more paces."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> mmm, finally, some actual kinda grown-up talking.


	36. Of Sparrows and Bards

Jaskier takes one look at the place and frowns. "This is--"

"Tattered," interjects Zoltan, gruffly. "Unkempt--"

"Debilitated. Dilapidated."

"What's that mean?"

"Falling apart."

"Oh. Yes. Dilapidated."

Dilapidated indeed; they hadn't even gone inside, but the _Rosemary and Thyme's_ visage was ghastly as it was-- chipped plaster and cracking wood; he's almost positive he sees a broken window on the uppermost floor-- and it also stank, even from this far away. Maybe it was to be expected of a brothel so obviously unkempt.

Jaskier sighs deeply, slouching his shoulders in disdain. "This will take quite a bit of coin, won't it?" 

"It will," the dwarf says. "Could always sell it back ta Junior and move on."

"Sell it?" he scoffs. "Perish the thought, we'll manage just fine. I'll pull some strings-- in the meantime come along, let's air her out."

\--

While it isn't impossible, it is most definitely frustrating to scrub at your bloodied face without a mirror in hand, unsure if you've done the job thoroughly enough, so Geralt takes it upon himself to swipe the dampened cloth across the bard's admittedly shabby countenance. Not that he doesn't take care of himself; its just been a while, a good two weeks or so, since he'd taken a razor to his face.

The man is careful in his movements, cupping his chin with that same delicacy with which he held Ettariel, and also immensely focused on his task. With nothing else to occupy himself, Jaskier has taken to painting pictures with the rolling clouds ( "I see a sparrow," he says, "and a rabbit-- and here along comes a dog to chase the rabbit as the sparrow watches from its perch." ) and looping Geralt's medallion around his finger.

The cloth drags again across his cheek-- he's certainly made a mess of himself-- and then swipes along his bottom lip, then lower along his chin.

"I heard a story of a dog and sparrow once," he says, loosening his hold as Geralt pulls back to dampen their rag further.

"Hmm."

Jaskier leans back onto his hands, tilting his head to follow the would-be protagonists across the sky. "The dog, left to starve by its master, decides it is in his best interest to leave for the city. Along the way he happens across a sparrow who deigns to accompany him. They become friends, and as a sign of gratitude for both company and protection the sparrow brings him scraps of meat and bread."

He pauses just enough to right himself as Geralt returns to his ministrations.

"Despite this, the dog is still rather weak," he continues. "It isn't much that a sparrow can carry in its beak, and scraps can only do so much for one already so malnourished. He grows tired, as one does, and lies down on the road to rest. As the sky grows dark the sparrow tells her companion that the road is not safe to sleep in, but he is much too tired to move-- so she resigns herself to sleep beside him.

In the dead of night a merchant cart approaches and the sparrow wakes, but despite her flittering about her companion does not wake. Instead, she flies to meet the man driving the cart and says, 'Sir, you must stop. There is a dog in the road, and if you aren't careful you will hit him.'"

"Hmm," Geralt says. "Sparrows can't speak."

"This one can," the bard argues. "In any case, the man doesn't listen. He continues onward and runs right over the sparrow's companion."

The Witcher pauses. "The dog dies?"

"The dog dies," Jaskier agrees solemnly, "and the sparrow, in her immense giref, curses the man. 'You will be forever poor,' she says, and she circles his cart and pokes holes in his wine barrels so that they empty. 'You will have no steed to carry you,' she says, and pecks out the eyes of his horse. Enraged, the man swings at her with an axe, but he only manages to hit his other mare, who drops dead. With no cargo and no steed, the man is forced to return home without profit."

"She could've set the horses free," Geralt points out, "instead of killing them."

Roach lets out a huff some ways off, which might have been one of agreement were she not a horse and therefore unable to comprehend the Common Tongue. The bard inclines his head, then pulls the cloth from Geralt's grip and leans over to wet it again.

"Had she not been overcome by grief," he says, "I think she would have. But she was, and she did, and she doesn't stop there. She follows the man home, calls to her kin, and they feast on his crops. Feeling his losses horribly, the merchant comes at her again with his axe, but she is too swift, and so only succeeds in bashing in his windows. The sparrow, noting this opening, flies in and wreaks havock. In his frenzy he axes his stove, his table, his wall-- eventually he throws it aside and after much struggling manages to capture the sparrow in his hands instead."

"He kills it."

"He finds a swift death too merciful for this sparrow, so he swallows her whole--"

"A man can't--"

Jaskier raises his brows, then sets to scrubbing at the skin beneath his collar. "It is a story, Geralt, and he swallows her whole. The problem, therein, is that she is still alive-- so he hands his axe to his wife and says, 'When the bird exposes itself, you must kill it.' The bird climbs her way back up, pokes her head through his mouth, and the wife swings. Too bad, it is, that she has never before held an axe. The poor woman cleaves her husband's head straight off, and the sparrow flies free."

"And then?" Geralt questions.

"Then nothing," the bard says. "That is how the story ends."

"That's--"

"Grim?" He says, smiling like he's just said something incredibly clever. "Very."

\--

He meets her in a shoddy tavern, of course, with every intention of talking her into his bed-- that is, until she piques his interest. It seems silly that he hadn't noticed immediately-- except maybe it wasn't. Despite her broadened shoulders and slender hips, and the _barest_ hint of stubble adorning her jaw ( not to mention that she had some height on him ), she was rather pretty.

"Hello," he says, apparently unable to come up with anything better. "You're--"

"Elihal," she says, extending a hand. He takes it, and muses at the fact that it's almost as large as Geralt's. "And you are?"

"Jaskier," he says, pleasantly. Then, "I was going to say ravishing."

The smile that works onto her face is bright, and decidedly pleased. She leans in close.

"Buy me a drink?"

"Gladly," he says.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 'The Dog and The Sparrow,' by the Brothers Grimm is and always will be my favorite story of theirs


	37. Jaskier and His Blinding Optimism

"Absolutely not," the Witcher drawls-- and for what it's worth, Jaskier levels him with his best impression of 'stoic witchery-ness'. It doesn't work; partly because he isn't a Witcher, and partly because he isn't in the least bit intimidating ( mostly because Witchers don't fidget their trousers off, like his bouncing knee is currently attempting ).

Geralt only resumes his glowering over the lip of his tankard and performs a rudimentary sweep of the dreary little inn. No one has bothered them ( yet ), aside from a haggard man with teeth so rotted and breath so foul the bard found himself turning bodily away. He'd offered them ( Well, _Geralt_ , but they were a pair! Bound at the hip! ) coin to slay the 'weeping woman' plaguing their fields, a contract of which the Witcher accepts without thought, and _almost_ turned away before Jaskier could interject.

( " _Ah, uhm, no_ ," he'd said-- and it almost wasn't worth it when the man turned and fanned his breath over his face. _Almost._ " _Half pay upfront, or we'll be off come morning._ "

" _Half pay?_ " The raggedy man scoffs. " _How am I ta know youse won't just take it an' scamper off._ "

The bard merely rests his chin in the palm of his hand and turns his gaze elsewhere. " _Geralt, if they aren't going to pay it isn't worth our time. It's only a waste of resources._ "

" _Hmm_." )

The coin sits between them now, piled between them like an offering, and the 'weeping woman--'

"I want to see her," Jaskier whines, foregoing his previous tactic. Instead he shoves a foot forward between Geralt's shins, in a petulant attempt to garner his attention, and leans forward.

"You can't come," Geralt says, and the only indication of acknowledgment he gives of their position is in the way he crosses his ankles and traps the bard's boot.

Resigned to his fate, said bard slumps back into his seat.

"It's--"

"A Noonwraith," the bard interrupts. "'Weeping woman,' field of grain, scorched bodies bathing in the first dregs of summer's sun. I've been with you long enough to put things together."

"Dangerous," he finishes. "You know what she is, what she's done. She would kill you."

"You wouldn't let her."

"I wouldn't _let_ her," Geralt agrees. "But she would."

Jaskier frowns. "But if she's occupied with--"

"And what happens when she splits into three and there is only one sword between us?" The Witcher tips his drink onto its edge-- not enough to slosh anything out, just an absentminded movement. "Yarden will slow a wraith only within ten yards; outside it they are too fast for a man to see, much less a Witcher to hit-- and even if I _did_ manage a blow it would pass through while she remained outside the circle."

"I wouldn't get hurt," Jaskier says. "I have faith enough in your abilities."

"Blind faith is not the same as cautious optimism."

"You're a piece of work," the bard mutters.

Geralt lifts his drink. "You're a child," he quips.

Jaskier shifts, as much as he can with his leg pinned at the ankle, and lowly says, "Forty."

Though reluctant as he always is to admit it, it's well worth it to watch Geralt outright _bristle._ Time was abhorrently fluid to the man-- with companions reluctant to age ( a pack of Witchers, a sorceress, a functionally immortal bard ) it was no wonder.

He smiles and leans a bit closer, despite the difficulties his position presents. "Forty-one next spring."

It must be said, out of _that,_ he wasn't quite expecting the soft, resounding hum or the lilting echo of, "Spring." Like some puzzle he hadn't seen slotting together-- Geralt searches his face just a moment longer, then resumes his glowering.

\--

_Spring._ Spring in Novigrad was like any other season ( except, perhaps, winter ). Bustling. He'd much rather be in Oxenfurt this time of year, flipping through a book of prose in that one sit-in set in the library, with the window pushed open and breeze tustling his hair. Instead he pushes up the sleeves of his undershirt and lugs another scrap of wood up over the edge of the _Rosemary and Thyme's_ third floor balcony and down into the piss-stenched alley.

He leans against the splintered railing and tries not to breathe too deeply.

"Never seen ye so invested," a man remarks, and Jaskier smiles despite himself-- can't quite keep the laugh from passing his lips. There's no inclination to turn, and no reason to as Zoltan settles easily into the space beside him.

The dwarf was right, of course. He remarks on this as he lowers onto his elbows; "True enough, I've never been one to settle." Never been one go start something and stick to it-- something new, better, bigger, bolder always captures his attention.

"I'm proud," says his companion, and the breath is all but punched from his lungs.

"I mean it," the man continues. "I can see how much it means to ya, this hunk o'..." thinking better of it, he waves a hand. "She'll turn out well. It'll take time. And coin. A shit ton o' coin. I trust you ta figure it all out."

Jaskier finds he doesn't quite know what to say-- he can't remember a time he's been complimented with such earnest-- but it seems he doesn't have to say a thing. His friend reaches up to pat his arm, then turns and heads back into the joined room.

"Oh!"

The bard turns, startled; his companion regards him easily, hand poised in the air.

"Callonetta is in town!" The dwarf chortles.

Jaskier turns again, sharply, before his friend can see the heat rising to his cheeks-- it doesn't seem to matter; Zoltan cackles all the way down to the main floor and it carries.

\--

He promises to stay behind, if only so that Geralt might release his foot ( which has fallen asleep quite some time ago )-- and Geralt does, after _he_ promises to return by the day after tomorrow. _Promises._ His look of wonder is swamped abruptly by the intense wash of discomfort he feels as his foot hits the floor.

As much as he itches to _follow,_ he doesn't.

( a promise is a promise, after all. )

And it is nice to feel the bite of Ettariel's strings against the pads of his calloused fingers; to sing until his throat is hoarse and to feel _good_ about it ( to sing about _Geralt_ and feel good about it ). Its been too long since Ettariel's played for a proper audience, and by the time he finishes for the night he's certain that everyone is feeling much better than they know what to do with. Her charm seeps into their bones, soothes every last ache-- a thank-you for listening, a parting gift until the next night.

The barkeep gives him stew and ale on the house and he accepts it graciously-- "Thank you--!" and even if it does taste like, well, _dirt--_ "It's delicious--!" it has more flavor than the rabbits Geralt puts over the fire, and-- _Oh, that's a thought._

Jaskier downs some of his ale ( he really doesn't like ale, but it's cold, at least ) and turns on the barkeep with a blinding grin.

"Does this fine village have an herbalist, or someone akin to the sort?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay so this took a long while to belt out. we can thank those Depression Hours for just sapping any motivation i had, rip. hope yall enjoyed it!


	38. Jaskier and the Abominable Marx

There is a cloth doll in his too big hands, adorned with a little bell. He turns it over, listens to the bell tinkle softly; he runs a finger over the worn and fraying stitching.

He wonders, briefly, if Cirilla would like one. Wonders if she's too old. Jaskier would know-- he doesn't know why he would, but he's certain.

The old woman before him shifts, pitches forward on her rocking chair. "Do you have a child, Master Witcher?"

_Witchers are sterile._ He pictures fair hair and bright green eyes. He sees freckle dusted cheeks, feels the ghost of impossibly small hands press against his face-- heedless of the litany of little scars and stubble littered there.

" _You'll come back for me, won't you?_ "

"Yes," he murmurs. _Always._ He swallows, feeling incredibly small despite the fact that he's far too big for this stool-- far too big for this house.

"I can see it in your eyes," she laughs.

For the life of him he can't figure out what to say to that, so he says nothing.

"Son or daughter?"

The Witcher turns the doll in his hands again; he should stop, it looks as if it might fall apart by a breeze as it is.

"Daughter," he says.

" _Do I scare you?_ " He asks. She peers up from the fire, he can hear the movement ( the rustle of her hair falling down her back, the way her cloak shifts over her shoulders ) but he doesn't dare turn. Besides, he already knows the answer, he can smell it-- or, rather, the lack of it.

" _Scare me?_ " She huffs. " _You are my destiny, how could I ever be afraid of you?_ "

\--

"You should compete," Roderick muses, through a mouthful of his sandwich. The retired professor smiles, Jaskier watches his face crinkle under the weight of it.

( Roderick furrows his brows. " _You know,_ _Jules_ ," he hums. " _You look about the same as you did as a lad._ "

The bard only smiles. )

"Should I?" He questions-- it's bizarre, sitting here again ( without Matilda; she's off into the country, living under the care of her children ). Each year the differences strike him a little harder. Each year he performs at the university he plays with the intent of breathing a little life into his old acquaintances-- it works, but only so much.

Time will catch up to them sooner rather than later. Roderick, he muses, is older than Geralt-- by a decade or so, in fact.

( In a month's time he will return to Kerack to attend his father's funeral; the last of his immediate family will be tucked well into the dirt. He won't have any words to spare him. His cousin, Ferrant, appointed Viscount de Lettenhove, will speak in his place. )

"You should," the other says. "For old times sake, if nothing else. Marx will be there."

Jaskier wets his lips and leans forward as a grin splits his face. "You should've led with that, my friend!"

"Callonetta will be there, too."

"Sorry," he says. _"Who?"_

Roderick wipes the crumbs from his mouth, then from his hands. "An up and coming trobaritz who graduated a handful of years after you left us. Priscilla by namesake, Callonetta on stage. She's good. As good as you, I'd wager."

Jaskier huffs. "No one's as good as me," he maintains.

The man hums, thoughtful. A moment of silence stretches between them, so he gathers his drink-- in time for his old acquaintance to open his mouth and say, "You're good, Julian. She just has better tits."

As he chokes on his drink, he finds he's simultaneously disappointed and relieved to note that his life does not flash before his eyes.

\--

Jaskier's mood sours as soon as the salt-and-pepper haired bastard shows himself backstage. Not even the pretty trobairitz to his right, plucking away at her lute, is enough to lift his spirits.

It's a practiced song and dance, an age old rivalry spanning decades; the man appraises him, and he takes pride in the question furrowed beneath his brow-- in the way he steps forward curiously, then back again. They exchange terse smiles and clap eachother lightly on the arm.

"You haven't changed," the man says, shortly.

Jaskier frowns. "You have." Much to his disappointment, he's aged like a fine wine. Its been years; he was hoping for some spots, maybe wrinkles or a loss of teeth. At the very least for him go have gotten fat off the delicacies offered by the courts. Unthinkingly, he reaches forward to squeeze the troubadour's bicep. Definitely not fat.

Valdo Marx rolls his eyes and swats his hand away roughly in the same moment. "You look like you've barely made it through puberty," he snarks. "What is it, a glamour? Aging not take kindly to you, Dandelion?"

Affronted, he cradles his frankly _stinging_ hand to his chest. "Bollocks to you, Pansy."

The troubadour inclines his head, ever cordial. "Good luck tonight, Julian."

"I hope you slip on the spilled milk of Melitele's ample bosom as you take to the stage," Jaskier sneers. "I hope all your strings snap as you strum the first chord!" The trobairitz beside him, though he pays her no mind ( he's too busy glaring at the dismissive wave Marx sends his way as he retreats ), snorts.

"Pansy and Dandelion," she hums, pleasantly. "Quite the pair."

"Far from it," the bard says. "Valdo's a right bastard-- not to mention tone deaf. Besides, it's Buttercup."

"Valdo isn't-- well, alright." The man in question meets his eye across the room. "Maybe a bit. What's buttercup?"

Jaskier, ever petulant, sticks out his tongue, then turns and smiles pleasantly. "I am! Jaskier, that is. Means Buttercup."

She blinks; a very pretty, incredibly bemused sort of smile flits across her face as she pauses in her playing to extend a hand. He takes it.

"Call me Callonetta," she says. "I'll be beating you both tonight."

\--

Roderick was right about one thing; Callonetta _does_ have rather nice tits. What the man failed to mention, however, and what he's realized by the first note that passes her lips, is that she isn't _as good_ as him.

She is far _better._

He knows he's lost by the time the first verse comes to a close, but he intends to sing his heart out anyway-- if he's going to lose, he'll at least lose better than _Valdo Marx._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> me;  
> me going back and changing the timeline;  
> me doing it again;  
> yall; please what  
> me; hold on  
> me, doing it again; sorry i just-  
> yall;  
> me; one more time-
> 
> also tbh i don't like this chapter too much but it's mental health hours and i'm tryna stimulate a gooood headspace by being productive so like yeah heh


	39. Jaskier and The Lilac Trousers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> givin you guys an extra long chapter to make up for my mental slackin

Geralt comes back to him coated in a fine layer of... something. _Dust,_ he thinks. It practically plumes off him as he falls into the chair beside the fire and he peers up with the most pitiful expression he can muster-- its clear he tried to wipe it off, but seeing as his hands are just as dirty he can't imagine it went well. Jaskier wrinkles his nose, and with reckless abandon ( he'll mourn his trousers for days to come ), takes up the space between his legs so he can reach over and thumb the substance off his eyes, at least.

The Witcher looks as thankful as he can without actually looking thankful ( it's a good thing Jaskier has over a decade under his belt, so he can see it ), and the bard looks at his hands. Two things click into place. Firstly, this is not dust. It's very fine ash. Secondly--

"Tell me that this isn't the decimated corpse of a wraith on my hands."

Geralt doesn't get to answer-- or maybe he never intended to, which would have been an answer in itself-- as they are promptly interrupted by the stable hands stumbling into their room and sloshing water about. He thinks, as they stumble their way across the floor to the tub, that the floor will have more water than the bath itself.

"I didn't order a bath," Geralt says.

"Huh?" The bard pulls his gaze back-- and, well, his trousers are already filthy, so there's no harm in wiping his hands relatively clean on the fabric before he reaches over to smudge more off his companion's face. "No," he confirms. "I did. Told them to bring it up once they spotted you. 'Can't miss him,' I said, 'He'll be absolutely filthy.' Isn't that right, lads?"

With no response, he glances up-- it's almost comical how wide their eyes are ( one clutches his pail to his chest like a shield ); staring resolutely anywhere _except_ Geralt, who huffs as if trying to decide whether he should be offended.

"Bah," the bard says. "Not an ounce of humor between the three of you. Off, then, if you're done."

They scamper like wild hares at the sound of a snapped twig and it takes everything in him not to snark after them. Geralt hums.

"I mean really," he scoffs. "They looked about ready to piss themselves. You weren't even looking at them."

"I'm a Witcher," Geralt murmurs.

Jaskier rolls his eyes, extracting himself with a muted, "You're filthy, is what you are," as he turns to inspect the damage done to his trousers in the bedside mirror-- lilac, violet embroidery. Anna had them made, along with the matching doublet. "These were expensive."

"I didn't ask you to shove between my thighs."

"Anyone else would be happy to have me," the bard huffs.

"Doubtful."

"You should be exceedingly grateful, in any case," he says. "I didn't _have_ to clear your eyes. Take off your armor."

There is a telltale click of a buckle as the Witcher takes heed; a thud at the shucking of an arm brace. Another as a shoulder guard hits the wood. "Don't think we're moving a bit fast?" He questions.

"Fast?" Jaskier turns, frowns-- there's a lilt to Geralt's mouth that wasn't there before. A _smile,_ a small, barely there one, but a smile nonetheless. His heart does something funny-- something it hasn't done since--

" _We could head to the coast,_ " he says. " _Get away for a while._ "

He sets his hands on his hips, lifts his chin ( steadfastly ignoring the heat rising to his cheeks as he realises ).

' _I didn't ask you to shove between my thighs.'_

_'Take off your armor,'_ he'd said.

"Are you teasing me?"

The smile twitches further as the second brace drops-- "Where'd that humor go, Jaskier?"

"It never left," he huffs. _Jaskier_. _Bollocks_. "Where did you pick one up?"

"Inkeep had some to spare," Geralt quips. Then, quieter, "Help me?"

The bard obliges; rolls up the sleeves of his shirt as he crosses the floor. This isn't a bad dynamic, per se-- and he makes relatively quick works of the buckles, it seems as familiar to him now as the frets of his instrument-- just startlingly different. One more he's lifting the last shoulder guard, letting it clatter to the floor with the rest.

"Since when do you ask for help?"

"I need to ask you something," Geralt says, rather suddenly.

Jaskier pauses his ministrations enough to look up. Another difference-- the smile is gone, replaced with a furrowed brow. Worried. He can't remember him ever being so expressive ( a lot changes in a year, he supposes ). He gives a sharp tug-- Geralt puts a hand on his chest, surprised, but the bard swats it away quickly-- this buckle always liked to stick. 

"Don't touch my shirt with your filthy hands," he tuts. The man's chest piece falls slack between them; he steps back so that it can join its compatriots in the ever-growing bundle at their feet. "Go on, then."

Geralt grunts, sets to pulling the chainmail splayed across the lower half of his torso free. "The 'weeping woman,'" he says-- though if he's being honest, he's barely listening. As the pile grows he can't help but imagine the weight of it together, dragging you down as you walk ( As you fight, as you slosh through mud up to your thighs. Sewage up to your chest, heaving a great sword above your head ). The chainmail, as it is pulled, untucks the fabric of Geralt's undershirt.

He can make out a scar above his hip-- it's old. He wonders how old. If it was one they acquired together.

"She wasn't a woman."

Jaskier blinks, tears his gaze from pale flesh to look instead to the man's face.

"Pardon?"

"She was a child," the Witcher says-- and perhaps he shouldn't have, because the bard's hands fall to his sides. He knows how wraiths are made.

Jaskier's heart splinters like a-- like whatever it is that splinters.

"A child?" He echoes, mournfully.

"She had a little doll," Geralt continues, moving to discard his shirt entirely. "Well, it vaguely resembled one, with a little bell. Her grandmother gave it to me, said she carried it everywhere--" He pauses once his head passes the neckline, squints at Jaskier like he's just now seeing him. "Why do you look like that?"

Jaskier, possibly two steps ( maybe one step ) away from crying at the thought of a little dead girl and her little doll, waves a hand about instead of bothering with words.

"Stop," Geralt says. "You're sad."

"Very astute of you," the bard agrees.

Geralt pauses again to pull his shirt the rest of the way and discard it alongside everything else. "I meant," he says. "I wanted to ask... Do you think... Is Cirilla too old?"

Jaskier blinks up at him, lips parted, does an odd waving movement with his hands-- then another more dismissive gesture, and moves backward to perch on the foot of their bed.

"What on Melitele's earth are you asking me?" He questions. "Cirilla is... what, nearly fifteen? She's practically a baby, how is she too old?"

"No," Geralt says. "The doll."

"What, you saved it?"

"No," the Witcher huffs.

Utterly flummoxed, the bard wrinkles his nose.

"I meant," he tries again. "A doll. Any."

_Oh. Oh, dear heart._ "You want to buy Cirilla a doll."

"I thought--"

Jaskier brings a hand to his mouth, in a loose attempt to cover an unbidden smile at the thought. He hasn't seen Cirilla in years; hasn't seen her at Geralt's side since-- well, ever, actually, but--

" _Jaskier_."

"Geralt," he says. Maybe fifteen was erring a bit toward too old, but, after everything she's gone through, "I'm positive she would cherish anything you gift her."

He watches Geralt swallow, nod once-- notices his shoulders fall some.

"I'd love to meet her one day," he says. "Well, properly-- I think... I mean, I'd hope she remembered me."

The Witcher lilts his head. "You will," he says, like its a given.

"I will?"

"Yennefer will bring her to Kaer Morhen for the winter." He shifts, brow furrowed-- then moves fully, off toward the tub as he discards his trousers and boots. "She will train under myself and Vesemir. Possibly the others."

The others-- Lambert and Eskel, the bard assumes. "I don't understand," he says; he opts to make himself useful, gathering all of Geralt's discarded items as he settles himself into the tub. "Well-- I do understand, I suppose, but that's my point-- you can't bring her to Oxenfurt, or Novigrad."

Geralt hums. "I can't," he agrees.

Jaskier blinks. "Well-- Yes. Alright."

"Kaer Morhen is... well lived in... and--"

"Falling apart, I imagine," he says. "Er-- no offense. But a keep at the hands of four Witchers--"

"Five, sometimes."

"Five?"

"Coën. A Griffin."

"Okay," he says. "Five Witchers and a keep."

"I occupy the second tallest tower," Geralt continues. "The balcony overlooks the mountain pass."

"I'm sure it's beautiful," Jaskier muses.

"Breathtaking. You would like it."

The bard hums, takes the liberty of pulling a stool behind Geralt and plopping himself down onto it. He raises his brows as the man tilts his head back to look at him, as if he's gauging his expression.

"I'm sure I would," he offers.

Geralt sighs and sinks lower into the water, levering his molten gaze toward the opposite wall. The bard sets his hands on the edge of the tub and lifts himself so he arches over the man-- in hindsight it's a completely ridiculous position, but he can't bring himself to care. Geralt looks amused, in any case.

He wrinkles his nose. "You're being very peculiar, my friend. Can I be certain you're the same Witcher I parted with all those months ago?"

"Yes," Geralt says. Then he shifts. Then he flicks _dirty bath water_ in his face.

Appalled, disgusted and betrayed, Jaskier returns to his former position and promptly enacts his revenge by dumping a bucket of water over the Witcher's head. The accompanying growl really shouldn't set his heart aflutter ( but here he is ). He ignores it in favor of lathering up his hands, then the man's hair.

A few moments pass like this; Jaskier does his best to detangle the worst of the knots with his fingers, Geralt settles contentedly into his touch, and if he listens hard enough ( too bad that requires him go sit still, he can't manage it ) he swears the man was purring ( or something like it, anyways ). Surprisingly, it is Geralt that breaks it.

"There is a library at Kaer Morhen," he says.

"A cesspool of super secret Witchery knowledge?"

"Hmm," Geralt says. "Yes. But also books that Vesemir has collected over the years-- and Eskel. You would like it."

Jaskier hums, bemused. "I would?"

"You like books."

"I do," he agrees.

"Eskel plays the lute."

" _Oh?_ " _That_ grabs his attention-- enough for him to abandon his task to lean against his forearms. Geralt tilts his head back to meet his gaze. "Your brother studies music?"

"Mm," Geralt says. "He knows the basics, I believe. He's by no means a bard. You would like him."

"You keep saying I would like things," he points out. "But yes, I imagine I would. I'd've been willing to teach him a thing or two."

The Witcher furrows his brow. "But?"

"But?" He echoes. "I imagine stumbling upon you was my greatest stroke of luck-- it'd be a gods given miracle if I happened upon another of your kind, much less one of your brothers."

"Oh."

Jaskier raises a brow and reaches over, smears ash off the Witcher's jaw with his suds soaked hand. After a moment his expression settles. "I think you're trying to tell me something," he says eventually.

"I am," Geralt confirms.

He spares another moment to wipe at the man's cheek. "Go on, then, Master Witcher. No need to dance around the bush."

"Beat around the bush."

"I like dancing," he says.

"I know."

Jaskier huffs, then smiles a bit. "Out with it, Geralt."

"Come winter at Kaer Morhen."

_Huh._ He blinks. "Humans aren't allowed at Kaer Morhen," he points out. "You said so yourself, years ago."

"Cirilla is human," he counters.

Jaskier shakes his head. "Cirilla is the embodiment of Chaos," he retorts. "I'm _human_ human."

Geralt shakes his head. "You're different."

"Because of Ettariel?" He asks. "It isn't as if I can _do_ anything. She just makes me a better bard-- not that I wasn't already _fantastic_ \--"

"Not because of the lute," Geralt interrupts. "Because you're Jaskier."

The bard swallows. Suddenly it's rather challenging to hold the man's gaze. "I don't understand," he says.

"You're Jaskier," Geralt repeats. "You're better than human."

"Geralt--" He shifts-- that's... he's not sure what to make of it, really, though his heart isn't keen on calming down anytime soon.

"You don't want to?"

"That's not fair," Jaskier says. "Of course I want to. Do you want me to?"

Geralt frowns. "What do you mean?"

"An entire winter with me," he points out. "You can't just throw me out into the snow-- Well, you probably could. But I wouldn't appreciate it, and I also probably wouldn't survive--"

"Jaskier."

"-- I can't imagine the mountains are warm."

" _Jaskier_."

The bard allows his mouth to fall shut, shifts against his forearms-- his hand is starting to fall asleep, actually--

"Come winter at Kaer Morhen with me," Geralt says again.

Jaskier isn't quite sure what he's playing at, saying stuff that makes his heart flutter and his stomach flip-- maybe he isn't playing at anything. He wants to move, but he's always been hopeless to turn away. He pulls a hand back through the man's soapy locks.

"Okay," he breathes. "Yeah. Yes."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> jaskier; * slaps roof of geralt * this thing is absolutely disgusting


	40. The Dandelion and The Pansy

He _does_ lose ( well, if you can call second place _losing_ ), but he prides the fact that he does so _graciously_ and also _better_ than the blasted Valdo Marx ( who didn't even make the board! ). All in all, he's feeling rather lovely, even backed into an alcove with a hand positioned precariously against his windpipe.

"Think of it this way," he hums, against his better judgement. "If Callonetta hadn't shown, I would've taken lead and _you_ would've been on the boa-- _ack--_ "

Correction; he's feeling not so great, with a hand _crushing_ his windpipe.

Valdo leans forward-- Jaskier wraps a hand around the man's wrist, shoves another toward his face, because, really, _really,_ they're getting far too old for this-- and then turns his face away with a curled lip.

He says nothing, but his fingers tighten infinitesimally, which is becoming increasingly problematic. If they keep this up, he might bruise-- or pass out, or die, or all three. In the end, when it is clear the man is too lost in his head to realise he's outright _killing a man,_ he kicks out, thankfully connects with the man's knee with enough force behind it for him to pull back with a hiss.

The bard sucks in an incredibly pained but remarkably refreshing breath of air and feels about the tenderness of his throat. Satisfied his trachea hasn't somehow broken, and that the other has no intention to jump his bones ( again ) in the least pleasant sense, he slides down onto the alcove seat.

"Mad man!" He blurts. "Heathen! Utter _s_ _coundrel!_ You could've _killed_ me! Or _worse_ , messed up my voice!"

Valdo huffs. "Cut the dramatics, Dandelion. We both know you can hold your breath."

_True_. Also, _rude._ "That's rather beside the point!"

"I don't get why you bother turning up to these events--"

"I have friends here."

"No, you don't."

" _You_ don't, you right _bastard._ " 

"Name one," the troubadour chides.

"Roderick," he says. "Matilda, Darla, Alexander--"

"I said _one_ ," Valdo sneers. "Still can't follow direction, can we?"

_A fifth because he never learns._

Jaskier glances up with every intention of snarking back. Instead he sees himself-- gauntier, tired, crumpled against the back wall--

"Why do you look like that?"

"What?" He blinks. Valdo regards him with something like concern, or maybe disgust. He turns his gaze to the ceiling.

"You've paled," he says. "Look like you've seen a ghost."

"Tired," the bard says. What else would he say? _I think I'm haunting myself._ "I'm tired. I think-- I might excuse myself from the remainder of the function."

"You're telling me? I don't care what you do."

Jaskier huffs. When he looks, Valdo's gaze is fixed on the cuffs of his sleeves as he fiddles with them. "Do you remember the Madame?"

For a moment he doesn't think the other will reply-- maybe he _doesn't,_ maybe this whole time--

"I remember the time she broke your fingers," he says. "I remember the time she split the skin of your back. I remember--"

"Enough," the bard sighs.

"She left you beaten and bloody on the lecture hall floor to be--"

" _Enough,_ Pansy--"

"-- found in the morning, hoping to find you dead. Disappointed her there, too, didn't you? Curled in on yourself against the desk, tear stains cutting through the dried blood caked to your cheeks. Left behind a stain on the boards. I watched you scrub at it until your fingers bled, until you left us. It never went away completely."

Jaskier lets his head fall back against the wall.

"I found you," Valdo says. "I carried you to the infirmary. Your blood stained my hands. You think I could forget?"

"You've never had qualms about spilling my blood," he points out.

"No, I haven't." A huff passes the troubadour's lips. "Would've been easier on us all, had you just died."

"She never laid a hand on you."

"The threat hung in the air. You were proof enough."

"You're welcome."

"Pardon?" He doesn't see it-- but he hears the incredulous lilt-- the way the man shifts. "I'm meant to thank you?"

"For pulling your heads out of your asses," he says.

"You were a child. A stupid, silly child."

_"Silly Julian."_

"I saw sense where the rest of you couldn't," he says. "So I forced you to look."

"We all knew the Madame was a whore," says Valdo.

"You thought her an impervious whore. She was just a woman."

"She's dead now. Has been a long time."

"Good riddance."

Valdo _laughs--_ well, _chuckles,_ fleetingly, just beneath his breath.

It's startling, but only just. Jaskier laxens in his posture and presses his palms to the stone bench, lets the chill of it seep into his palms. _What is this_?

"Why do you bother coming to these events?" He asks, again.

"I--"

"Have _friends_ here," he huffs. "That's not what I'm asking."

"What are you asking?"

"You never wanted to be a troubadour," Valdo says. "Never wanted to be a... bard. Never showed interest in any of it until that countess-- even then, you didn't pursue it."

"I hadn't considered it, that's true," he says. "I never gave thought to another way of life. I thought I was content within my position, but--"

"Forget I asked." The troubadour shifts again; Jaskier peers back at him. If he stares long enough he can still see the young man he schooled with behind his hardened features; something like a spark of life glinting behind murky gray irises snuffed out just as quickly.

"Pansy--"

"Quiet, Dandelion," Pansy pleads, upturning his palms in a placating gesture. "For once."

Dandelion swallows, shifts, slumps forward. "I can't," he says. The silence is stifling.

The troubadour grimaces. "Leave me, then. I don't wish to bear the burden of your voice any longer."

He sits there a moment longer; ghosts his fingers over his throat while Pansy watches. He should've left eons ago, as soon as he'd pulled back. Should've been scared. _It's Pansy._

"I'll see you," he says. _Somewhere, sometime, i_ _f we both survive another year; something tells me we will._

The troubadour turns away with a frown, doesn't deign him with a response; he doesn't have to. Dandelion pushes to his feet and stumbles after the sound of music.


	41. Jaskier and The Specter Dust

The Witcher, contented by his agreement, lifts his hand-- presumably with the intent of pressing it to his cheek, or something equally as damaging to his heart. Whatever it is, he most certainly _isn't_ having it, _no thank you._ He wrinkles his nose and pulls back entirely, resolutely ignoring the affronted huff he gets in turn.

"Excuse you," he says. "I won't have you touching me with your soggy, ash coated skin."

There's no way for him to catch Geralt's expression from his seat, but he'd bet his life it was a roll of eyes. The Witcher sinks lower into the water-- almost to the nose-- at the same time begrudgingly reaches for a cloth to lather up and sets to vigorously scrubbing at his arms.

\--

Callonetta's demeanor seems to veer sharply after his introduction. It's obvious she's heard of him-- maybe they know each other, maybe he's forgotten. _Oh, no--_ has he bedded her?

He casts a glance downward-- she sees him casting that aforementioned glance, and is very obviously off put, but no. He thinks he'd remember a woman like Callonetta.

Then again, maybe he wouldn't-- though he'd really like to think he wasn't that shallow. His mind is rarely where it should be, even in the gutter.

"You're really very good," he blurts.

That isn't what she was expecting, it seems, because she's staring like he's sprouted horns, and-- "I know," she says.

"Right." He scratches at his chin-- is that stubble? _Bollocks_. He probably looks a mess. "Good. I'm glad you know. I meant it. I like having competent competition-- Irene is good, too. I'm rather jealous of her range-- is that an odd thing to say? What I really meant was to congratulate you."

"You did?"

"I did," he affirms.

"I thought--" her lips upturn just a smidge. "Half the people here think you're a narcissistic bastard."

_Oh. Ouch._ The bard swallows, then nods. "Right," he echoes. His fingers flit lower, to the bare skin of his throat. "Who?" he questions-- _"I have friends_ _here_."

" _No_ , _you don't._ "

Should he be surprised? He isn't. He graduated much younger than his scholarly peers-- older than him, and _bitter_ because he was _better. Bitter_ because he _knew_ he was better ( not that he flaunts it so much-- at least not outrageously ). This trobaritz, presumably nearing his own age, yet graduated well after him, was right where she was expected to be.

" _As good as you,_ " says Roderick. _Better, by practice and circumstance._

"No. Nevermind," he says, instead. "I don't want to know. Good evening."

"Good evening?"

"Quite." Jaskier smiles thinly, turns on his heel. Callonetta ( he doesn't see her expression fall, already some paces away ) doesn't stop him.

\--

In Novigrad, Jaskier finds himself going out for drinks quite regularly ( except he doesn't really drink, too wrapped up in conversation-- or at least too wrapped up in being able to spiel without someone snarking back ). Elihal doesn't mind his ceaseless blathering-- in fact, they encourage it.

"It's endearing," they say. "You light up when voicing your passions."

So blather away he does. Sometimes with purpose-- "I believe I've come across a way to finance the renovation of my cabaret, though it's a rather delicate situation. I'll have to take my time." Sometimes without-- "Oh, you look dashing today-- Ah, is that an appropriate remark? What kind of stitching is this? I'm not sure I've seen it before--"

Elihal turns up in all manner of garbs-- a dress this week, trousers the next; a Skellige tunic, Nilfgaardian garb, a bare face, kohl lined eyes and painted lips. It's enrapturing in a delicate sort of way. He'd asked, once--

"I might present as a woman, I might present as a man. In the end, I'm only Elihal."

"What do you propose I use, then?" He'd asked.

Elihal frowns. "How do you mean?"

"Well," Jaskier lifts both hands, palms up. "There's masculine," he lifts the right, "as you might use for me. He, him, his, andthere's also feminine." Now he raises the left, "She, her, hers-- _but_ there's also a third."

"There is?"

"Of course," the bard chides. "One could argue the usage is _plural_ to negate the validity of it, but everyone uses it in the singular sense at one point or another so that derails the entire argument. If your hostess says, 'Someone tripped up and fell into the hay this morning,' you say, 'Did they? How funny!' Singular, not plural, yes?"

The elf nods, a tad bemusedly.

"He, him, his," the bard continues. "She, her, hers. They, them, theirs. Same principle, just negating the binary. To be quiet honest, I'm not keen on the binary myself. I feel no inclination to enforce it one way or the other; if you were to call me a woman or otherwise it doesn't invalidate my presentation."

"It wouldn't work for everything," Elihal points out. "If I were to speak of a husband or a wife, those would reflect--"

"Spouse," he says. "Partner. Significant other. 'This is their beloved, they're a fantastic pair, those two.'"

The elf pauses, then nods. "What of a child?"

"What of? You just did it."

"Oh. You're right," Elihal muses.

Jaskier only smiles. "You like it, then? I could always switch between them, if you'd prefer, though I may slip up from time to time without meaning to. In which case I apologize now, and promise to correct myself."

"No," Elihal says. "I like it. I do. I think... it could be nice. To just be Elihal."

"While you might present in a dual nature," the bard says, "you've always just been Elihal."

\--

"You have a print of my palm," the Witcher informs him without lifting his gaze. "On your chemise. Above your breast, to your left."

He's right; he peers down and there's a splotch of smokey gray iridescence-- specter dust shaped to the man's palm just above his heart. Curiously, he presses his hand to it. Geralt's is, to no one's surprise, especially not his own, bigger.

"Jaskier," the Witcher murmurs.

The bard lifts his gaze-- Geralt has shifted in the bath to face him, it seems, and-- _oh_. He flushes unbidden, clears his throat as he hastily drops his hand back into his lap. "Yes?"

"Hmm." The lilt returns. A smile. Small, but no less genuine. _I missed you._

Jaskier swallows, turns his gaze elsewhere. _I've missed you too._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> nobody;
> 
> geralt; hmm.
> 
> jaskier; * gay panic *


	42. Jaskier and the Not-So-Creased Parchment

"One bed."

"Hm. Yes. I see that, now."

"You didn't before?"

"Well, it wasn't an issue before you arrived. I didn't give it a thought--"

"I'll--"

"Don't start with that. You need proper rest, and I've been settled for two nights. I can--"

"No need. We--"

"Can we?"

"What?"

"Nothing!" Jaskier wrinkles his nose. "It's just, if it bothers you--"

"It doesn't," Geralt says. Jaskier hears him shift, feels the heat of his gaze, pointedly does not look. "Why would it?"

"Good," he blurts. Then, "I mean, yes. Fine. Alright. I don't know." _Bollocks._ He rubs at his chin-- clean shaven, now. First thing he did once Geralt had gone on his merry way, take a razor to his scruff. Second thing he did was take a bath-- a long one. He runs his hand over his throat, settles it at his shoulder.

"If it bothers _you--_ "

_Bollocks!_ "It doesn't," he says, hastily. "Of course it doesn't." _Of course?_ He clears his throat. Of course it doesn't, they'd done it before. Often, even. Like, almost every night. It shouldn't be an ordeal now.

"Stop that," the Witcher murmurs, not unkindly.

He does look, now. Turns his head to meet the man's gaze, and feels damned abashed when he does. "What?"

Geralt inclines his head. "You're tapping your foot."

He's right, he _is_ tapping his foot-- so he stops, moves off toward the desk to fiddle with ( and frown at ) his parchment instead. Blank, as usual-- he's narrowed down two reasons as to why he can't write anymore; first is that he's uninspired, second is that he's simply a broken bard ( run himself dry, has nothing more to say-- _please don't be that one_ ).

"I'm sorry," the Witcher says, suddenly, and that particular inotation runs a shiver down his spine. 

He smoothes down the paper ( even though it doesn't need it ). "What?"

"I'm sorry," he says again, so the bard looks this time. Finds Geralt still standing in the center of the room, arms folded and shoulders drawn, looking almost grievously at the poorly constructed bed in front of him. "I fucked up."

He did. Jaskier decides he probably shouldn't say that, only turns to tuck his belongings away.

"Jaskier," he says. "If you want to go--"

"I would have done so." He means it, surprisingly. Maybe he _should_ want to go, after everything, but despite the swamping discomfort and uncertainty he _desperately_ wants to stay.

"We'll go west."

"West?"

"Of the Mahakam. That way if you change your mind, I'll be able to escort you to Oxenfurt before winter settles."

"Novigrad," he says. "I wouldn't make the summer's end, no point in returning to Oxenfurt. I won't change my mind, by the way."

"You don't know that," Geralt points out, even though he _does._ Anxiety is a funny look on the man-- he's, well, maybe not _small,_ but smaller without the bulk of his armor. Smaller still, curling in on himself. "Why Novigrad?" He questions.

"I do know," Jaskier affirms, instead. The other looks skeptical, still ( as much as he can while still searing holes into the bedspread ). "I won't leave unless you make me. Do you want me to?"

"No."

"Alright," he says. "We're settled." 

"Jaskier--" The bard snorts ( _attractively_ , mind you ).

"Get in the damned bed, Geralt." 

The look Geralt gives him is distinctly unimpressed, almost viscerally uncomfortable, but he listens-- for once, sort of. Skirts around the edge of the bed as if he might tell him to stop, perches on the edge so that he sits facing the door and closes his eyes. He won't lie down until he does, as usual.

Something in Jaskier's heart melts. Or sizzles. Or cracks. Maybe all three at once. He goes over his belongings again; parchment, ink, quill-- the little bags of tea spices he bought from the local herbalist as a surprise, he tucks them further in. Geralt's painfully quiet and dreadfully still throughout the entire process.

_Fuck it._ He climbs onto the bed, shuffles over, plasters himself to the man's back and embraces him hard enough to probably break a lesser man's neck.

Geralt's hand runs over his arms, settles atop one of his hands. The tension seeps from his shoulders like cold seeps from a man's bones in the winter. They don't do this-- but they do now, apparently; the bard buries his face in his hair, and he lets him.

"Jaskier." _I'm sorry._

"Geralt," he hums. _I know._

\--

Laying here now, pressed shoulder to shoulder, Jaskier decides they are both blithering fools. Neither of them have spontaneously combusted due to their proximity, neither are at each other's throats. There's still a cut of tension in the air but he's certain it'll dissipate with time-- it's Geralt, after all. He couldn't harbor any ill will toward the man if he tried.

"We'll be okay," he decides. "I think we're already okay, it just hasn't sunk in yet."

"Hmm."

"Hmm," the bard agrees.

"You really will? Come with me to Kaer Morhen?" Geralt lilts his head a bit; the room is dark ( and chilled, though not unpleasantly ), but Jaskier can see the glinting of his amber eyes.

He hums. "You're a fool if you think I'd pass that up, Geralt."

"Hmm."

"Hmm, indeed. Glad to see that hasn't changed."

"What?"

"Your monosyllabic jargon."

"Hmm."

"Gods be, Geralt, go to bed."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> jaskier; what is this? could my pent up trauma and repressed feelings be negatively impacting my mental health and therefore impeeding on my works?
> 
> jaskier;
> 
> jaskier; nah.
> 
> do i like this chapter? not particularly, but i needed to dish something out so hm


	43. Jaskier and The Viper

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> mm, finally, some good fucking food

The first thing Jaskier notices is that he's _massive._ A mountain of a man, easily three times his size in bulk and towering over him with a snarl venomous enough to send a shiver down his spine.

"You're the bard," he says-- and unlike his companion's burring this is distinctly a _growl._ Deep and gravelly, rasping as if he has better things to save his breath for. He leans closer and Jaskier leans further back, clutching Ettariel tightly to his chest, as far as he can manage with the table edge digging into his lower spine. "I can smell him on you."

"Can you?" He questions, feebly. In hindsight, it's perfectly reasonable-- but to scent him out across a filthy, sweat-soaked tavern? He must _stink._

"Yes."

The bard swallows. "Well," he says. "He isn't here."

He's sloshing through bog water up to his thighs about now, heaving silver above his head ( or shoulder, more appropriately ) and sweeping it down in an arc-- hacking Drowners to halves without restraint.

The man curls his lip in a manner that turns his stomach unpleasantly-- not fear, but close-- and something glints in the torchlight as he shifts. He'd known as soon as he walked in; the way he crowded the door, the gait, the _eyes,_ his mere _presence_ turning heads, but this? The medallion hanging from his neck-- not a wolf, a serpent. A Viper.

He knows surprisingly little about the schools of the Witchers-- well, perhaps not surprisingly, as Geralt isn't so forthcoming and the tomes in Oxenfurt are abhorrently biased-- but he knows even less about this one in particular.

" _Vipers_ ," _Geralt hums, turning a rabbit pelt in his hands._ " _Quiet. Cunning._ "

"How do you know him?" He can't help but ask, Geralt can throttle him later if it does him in. "You're a Viper, he isn't. I understand the schools have been closed off for decades, and I don't suppose you all gather to reminisce in some backwater taven."

The Witcher blinks.

The silence stretches long enough to become uncomfortable. He's acutely aware of the heads turned toward them, of the picture they must be painting; a goliath and a pinned bard-- "I could buy you a drink," he blurts. "A hot meal-- really, don't look at me like that--" his expression hasn't shifted in the slightest, it's all in the glower. "I mean you no harm. I have no bias on you, I don't even know who you are."

The Witcher blinks again. Then pulls back some. "You talk too much."

A tad disheartening, he'll admit, though he's grateful to be able to stand straight under the man's cautiously observant gaze. To peel the skin of his palm from Ettariel's strings and flex his fingers while the man surveys his surroundings.

"Alright," says the Viper.

The tavern's atmosphere is tense ( not a word has been spoken since his arrival; it hardly seems like anyone's breathing out of anticipation ) but the bard finds he doesn't care. His assent lifts his spirits enough to dissipate the air with one fluid motion-- he reaches out slowly, well within the man's sights, and presses a palm to his bare arm. The Viper's lip curls, the man tenses like a snake getting ready to lurch-- he quiets it with the barest raise of his brow.

"Wonderful," he says. His palm rests just long enough as he passes for the patrons to take a hint-- they're two men catching up over a drink, now. Nothing to stare after. No slaughter to incur. Some turn back to their drinks, mutter lowly-- some stare at their tables, at each other, through the window.

Jaskier prances across the floor to the bar, followed by a lumbering Viper. He gets an odd look from the barkeep-- _two Witchers in two days, and you dine with both?_ Something else beneath it-- _are you safe?_ He shrugs, dismisses the stare with a flippant wave and an order of their heartiest meal and a tankard of their strongest ale. Maybe he's eccentric, maybe overly optimistic, but he likes to think he can handle himself well enough even at the face of a strange Witcher ( not that he's seen many; only Geralt ).

In any case, the Viper is-- maybe not _docile_ , but cautiously tolerant. Jaskier can't blame him; he motions to his left, to the most shrouded corner of the tavern that still has a clear view of the door ( and is quietly pleased when the Witcher appraises it and finds it suitable enough to lumber over and take his seat ). He's terrifying in an awe-inspiring way, shrouded in dark yet visible by his sheer bulk and near-luminous eyes-- Jaskier probably _shouldn't_ feel so giddy, but as he scampers over with his peace offerings and it becomes clearer that while he's imposing he's by no means threatening ( at least not now ) he can't quite keep the grin back as he takes a seat ( across, not beside, give him space ).

"You," he says, as the Viper brings his drink to his mouth ( the tankard is dwarfed in his hands, he notices ), "are the second Witcher I've ever met. Mine-- Er, my friend isn't so forthcoming on your kind--"

"Wisely," the Witcher drawls. Which is, he supposes, fair. "Letho."

"Huh?" Jaskier blinks.

The man sets down his drink, turns his attention to the food. "Of Gulet."

"Oh!" The bard leans forward. "Letho, you must excuse me-- I get excited, forget my manners. I'm Jaskier-- the bard, as you know."

"Hmm. I know," he agrees, inclining his head. "You sing of us. Exaggeratedly."

"Only trying to do my part--"

"Reverently, almost." Letho continues, shoveling as much food as he can with his toothpick of a fork into his mouth. Jaskier silences himself, the Viper takes his time chewing ( he wonders how long its been since he was served a proper meal ). "I'm curious," he says, eventually. "What is your part?"

"Not almost," the bard counters. "You've heard them, I assume. I wish to make your Path less tremulous, to provide sure footing-- perhaps a warm welcome, one day. Instead of this."

"This was warm," argues the Viper.

"This was _tolerant._ They sneer at others--" at _Geralt--_ "They look at you and they _fear._ And for what?"

"I could kill them."

"I could kill a man, too. Anyone could. It's prejudice, plain and simple," he says. "They hate you because they can, not because of anything you are-- and no one here will say otherwise because I am right. What you are is a man brought up by unfortunate circumstance, you do what you must to survive."

"What do you know of it?" Letho questions. "I am no man."

Jaskier frowns. "I know enough," he says. "It's etched just there, beneath your skin. I can see it."

"You know it," the Viper supplies.

"To an extent, I suppose. I've walked beside--"

"Not Geralt's Path," Letho dismisses. "Your own."

"My tribulations are hardly on par with--"

"Pain is pain." The Witcher pushes the food around his plate. "It is all the same. You, bard, are marred in many places-- I hear the way your shoulder grinds in its socket. My circumstance, my upbringing, however gruesome, does not invalidate yours. There is no pain that is worse than another. We make do."

Jaskier finds he can do little more than nod, which Letho seems to not mind. He's content to work through his meal in relative silence ( the tavern has worked itself back into boisterously held conversation ), and the bard is content to mill about his company while plucking idly at Ettariel's strings. It isn't until his tankard is drained that he speaks again.

"You know that instrument is cursed, right?" He asks.

Ettariel, affronted, gives off the closest thing to a twang he's ever heard-- and he, affronted on her behalf, frowns. "Ettariel is not _cursed,_ " he says. "She is _blessed._ She was a gift from Filivandrel, king of elves. You've heard Toss A Coin, haven't you? I've had her at my side since my early twenties."

Letho raises a brow. "Your early twenties."

"That's what you take from it?" He huffs.

"The tale is horse shit," the Witcher says, with a shrug. Jaskier opens his mouth in protest, but-- "You don't look to be--"

"I am," he interrupts. "Into my forties, now. Not that it's any of your business."

Letho of Gulet appraises him and Ettariel with furrowed brows as he signals the barmaid for a refill. "Hmm."

It might be wishful thinking; Jaskier believes he sees the man's mouth twitch at the corner.


	44. Jaskier and The Pansy

"Your Path bears no fruit," Letho drawls. "Besides, perhaps, fortune. Yet you walk. You slog beside a battered dog instead of cozying up in some noble's estate."

"If I wanted _that,_ " Jaskier says, "I would never have left Kerack."

\--

"Ferrant! Look!" 

Julian is eight. He stumbles through the brambles bordering the estate grounds, up to the elbows and knees in muck-- he'll get the strap for it later, but for now he'll relish in the feeling of it caked along his skin-- after his cousin.

Ferrant, only eleven at the time, will startle at Julian's rapid approach and nick his finger on the rose stem he's inspecting. Julian finds him there, standing amidst the roses and sucking on his finger, and it's there that he presents his prize.

"What on Melitele's good earth is that?" The boy grimaces.

Julian grins so wide it's a wonder he isn't split in two. "A frog!" He exclaims. "It's wonderful, isn't it?"

"It looks goopy," says Ferrant, distastefully. "And so do you! You're caked in mud. It's even in your hair." As if to enunciate his point, the boy reaches forward to pull a clump of wet dirt from his hair and fling it into the flowerbed. "Your father's gonna string you by the ears, Julian."

"He will not!" Julian argues. At least, he never has before. He looks down at the critter sitting patiently in his cupped hands; takes in his arms, the ruined front of his shirt and pants, his waterlogged shoes.

"He will," Ferrant maintains, shaking his head. "Your father's a very angry man."

"Father isn't _that_ scary," he says. "And he isn't angry _all_ the time, only when Mother is-- and she _is_ angry all the time, but she's away for now." Despite this, he pouts mournfully.

His cousin nods, very much in agreement. "I'll tell you what, Julian." The boy reaches over to clap his shoulder, but opts out before he cakes him palm in mud. "We'll set the frog free and go in through the kitchens-- convince the service to smuggle you clothes while we scrub you clean."

A noble pursuit, and Julian is very much appreciative and eager to go along with it-- but the plan hinges entirely on where the staff in question lie their loyalties. The cook, as it happens, is not fond of children. Less so of dirty ones.

His father is not pleased.

The frog, however, happily makes home in the garden's fountain.

\--

Julian is nineteen. Every breath he takes is fleeting and rattles past his lips; a hand kneads firmly into the bare skin between his shoulders. He groans, fists the sheets beneath him tightly.

"Look at you." A second hand sinks into his hair. It tugs. He reaches-- he _tries_ to reach, but the flesh of his back is _burning_ with the strain, and his fingers both ache fiercely refuse to comply. His skin is _searing_ straight from the bone.

The hand tugs again; it jostles something, leaves him breathless and seeing white-- not breathless, _screaming._ He can't hear it, but he must've; the hand between his shoulders clamps down over his mouth instead. The one in his hair loosens, begins carding through his locks.

Warmth blossoms across his back, presses against his temple-- less searing, more imposing. It shifts; morphs into a warm breath against the shell of his ear.

"You have to be quiet."

Lips press to the crown of his head. Again, to his temple. Again, just behind his ear-- the base of his neck, his shoulder. Their hand slips from his mouth and he slumps back onto the bedding with a huff.

"What would you do without me, Dandelion?" Valdo mutters. "Die, I imagine."

" _Pansy_ ," he sighs.

"Are you addled?" He snaps. "Is that what you want? Do you want to die, Julian? It was a near thing, anyone else would've left you there."

" _Pansy_ ," he says again. "It's okay."

The hand in his hair stills, then tightens back into grip fierce enough to water his eyes, tugs his head to the side. Valdo scowls down at him, steely eyes nearly black in the dark. "It isn't okay," he hisses. " _You_ are not okay, and I am the _only_ person who cares."

\--

Now perched as he is on the bedding, with Geralt between his knees, he takes the man's hair in his digits and tugs. Lightly, that is; weaving one braid along one side with deft fingers as the Witcher tells his own tale.

( " _Where is he?_ " the Wolf snarls, yet the expression snuffs in an instant, replaced with something much softer. " _Are you well?_ " _I wasn't here to keep you safe. Did he hurt you?_

" _He left,_ " he'd said. " _He was looking for you-- Yes, yes, Geralt. I'm fine-- you, on the other hand, look like shit." )_

"I saved his life," the Witcher says now. "I found him in a heap on the forest floor beside a basilisk. It lie there, beheaded and tongue lolling from its maw, the Viper beside it so still that I'd've thought him dead, too, if not for the sputtering of his heart. I didn't know who he was, then. I saw one of my own, did what I could with what I had."

Jaskier lets the braid sit as he shifts to take up the other side. "He owes you his life," he muses. "Yet you were surprised that he turned up?"

"No. That was fine. Had I been there I'd've turned him away."

"But?"

"But I _wasn't,_ " Geralt continues. "And you were-- and _Letho--_ he's a Witcher, yes. But he isn't like me, Jaskier--"

"No one is like you, Geralt," the bard interjects.

"Witchers should not meddle in the affairs of men, and yet--"

"You do," he points out. "All the time."

Geralt huffs, then pushes himself back into his chest-- making it exceedingly difficult to finish off his braid, which was likely his intention-- so he abandons his task for now, tucks his work behind the man's ears, in favor of draping his arms over his shoulders and pulling him closer.

"Letho is a hired hand," Geralt murmurs. "A kingslayer. He'd behead a man for looking at him funny."

The bard hums. "I don't think he'd gut a man in the streets, as it were. I think he's walking his Path as best he can, as you all are-- though a set of questionable morals certainly plays into his character."

"And that is?"

"A _snake_."

The Witcher lets out a huff ( which Jaskier will be taking as the laugh it most definitely is ) and tilts his head back to search his face-- Jaskier inwardly prays for Melitele to rid him of his beating heart, or at least slow it down. Not that it would do any good at this point; he can't hide anything from Geralt. She could at least relieve him of the heat rising to his cheeks.

"Have a bath."

The bard blinks. "Excuse me?"

The Witcher grunts, then shifts-- _Melitele help him_. Reaches up and back, to cup the back of his head. Shifts again to press his nose to his neck. "A bath," he murmurs. "I can smell him."

Jaskier chuckles weakly; swallows and tries to ignore the coarseness of his friend's stubble against the base of his throat.

"Are you telling me I stink?" He blurts, incredulously.

"Hmm," Geralt says. "Yes."

Jaskier huffs, now. "That's how he found me, you know. Apparently I reek of you-- which is rather worrisome, actually, because oftentimes--"

" _You_ don't stink _,_ " Geralt interjects as he pulls his hand back. "How could you, with all your perfumes? I smell another _Witcher_ , as he did."

"So you want me to bathe--"

"Yes."

"-- because Letho clapped me on the back, some hours ago now, and you can somehow still smell it? Even though I don't _actually_ stink?"

Geralt works his jaw in a manner that betrays his embarrassment at such an outlandish request, yet solidifies his resolve. He shifts again to rest his head back against the bard's shoulder.

"Yes," he says again.

"Well then," the bard murmurs. "Allow me to finish off your hair before I do?"

\--

"I can see why he keeps you around."

Jaskier raises a brow, but a smile lilts his lips. "Can you?"

Letho snorts. "No."

_Ah,_ he thinks, _fair enough._

"The talk, though," he says. "Was... nice enough."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> letho; you're alright i guess
> 
> jaskier; :)
> 
> letho; nevermind.
> 
> jaskier; what? why?
> 
> letho; your vibes are off
> 
> jaskier; :(
> 
> letho; better.


	45. The Bard's Demise

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> longer than usual? yessir

It was hardly the first time he'd been pulled under, and it will most certainly not be the last-- and he _doesn't_ have a death wish, the frantic beating of his heart is testament enough to that-- but it _is_ the first time he didn't cry out ( not that it mattered, Geralt was turning toward him even as he thudded onto the bank-- " _Jaskier!_ " )-- and why _didn't_ he cry out? That's a funny thought for another day-- another moment, another instance where he isn't clawing at the ground while a beast sinks its talons into his flesh.

The pain is rudimentary ( he's felt far worse ), he's more occupied by other things ( staying on land, where he can breathe, for instance ). Kicking at the thing-- the _drowner, fuck's sake,_ raking its claws through the flesh of his calf as it drags him toward the water-- will do no good, he knows this ( he isn't _strong_ like a witcher, he isn't a _fighter,_ but he's smart enough ). Geralt is too far up the bank to reach him before he submerges ( the water is lapping at his back now ), he knows this too, so he resigns himself to his fate and stops fighting against the pull-- better to save his strength for other things.

Namely, holding his breath.

The first thing he notices as he is engulfed is that the water is _frigid,_ which is frankly criminal. It's _summer._ One would think, in this sweltering heat, that the water might warm up a bit, but _no._ His second train of thought is equally useless, about how the leg of his trousers are likely in tatters. His _third_ thought is the horrible realization that in the span of however many seconds its been, he's been dragged so far under that even if he _did_ relieve himself of the beast's grasp he'd never make it to the surface on his own.

He knows Geralt will come for him. Rationally, though, knows it won't really matter-- he won't be able to hold his breath long enough as it is. Irrationally, as talons break through the fabric of his doublet and teeth sink into the flesh of his thigh, he _screams._

Funny how a lungful of water burns.

( Something like a throat stuffed with petals, but not quite. Certainly not as poetic. )

\--

"Don't you want something more?" He asks.

Virginia only frowns, inclines her head. "What a silly question," she muses. "What more is there than this? My bed has been made; I should never want for a thing. I have them all, already."

Julian swallows and tugs at his collar.

"I don't know," he admits. "And yet I am wanting."

\--

Jaskier wakes to the sky and then to the muddy bank as he turns and _retches._ And then he sputters, coughs, gathers as much air as he's able before he retches again.

" _Fuck,_ " he chokes-- and promptly gets the wind knocked out of him as a hand slaps harshly against his back.

" _Do you want to die?"_ Pansy seethes _._

" _Shit,_ " Geralt says. "That wasn't-- I'm sorry-- _Fuck._ Hold on. Don't move."

Geralt can fuss all he wants-- he lets his head fall to the sand and focuses on just _breathing._ On ridding the searing from his lungs-- On a hand between his shoulders-- he reaches. The skin just above his hip tears with the motion-- or something like it. He feels it distantly; like peeling pelt from bone ( in this case flesh pulling apart from flesh ), a warmer wetness spilling down toward his stomach.

" _Fuck,_ " Geralt snaps. "I said _don't move,_ you fool of a bard."

Jaskier huffs. He makes to say something, he's sure of it ( snark about how now is _not_ the time for insults; _now_ is the time for _breathing_ and possibly a decade long _nap_ ), though nothing passes his lips.

" _Jaskier._ "

He waves the Witcher off with a flick of his wrist before letting it thud to the ground. Fluttering about will be well and good when he can hold air in his lungs again, maybe take stock of his injuries, but certainly not before. It's a wonder he's managed to stay awake as long as he has-- maybe it's the adrenaline. That, along with the lingering chill of the waters, would explain the suspicious lack of pain, at least.

Geralt allows him this moment of reprieve, more out of fear that his ministrations might prove more harmful than helpful ( but really, what was he expecting when he clapped his hand across his back while he was already struggling? ), but also with an accompanying shuffle that told Jaskier he was quickly becoming restless.

"How bad is it?" He huffs. "Bastard gnawed at my thigh-- most certainly _not_ the type of foreplay I--"

"I need to move you," Geralt interrupts.

"Fuck," he says again. 

Of course they had to move; he can't just lie here on the bank-- he'd bleed out. He probably already has dirt packing into his wounds-- although he hopes not, maybe his tattered trousers saved him from that particular nightmare. So yes, they really should move.

Instead he folds his arms and rests his forehead atop them.

"I'm quite fine here, I think."

"I can't tend to you here," Geralt maintains.

"It's not that bad."

"You're bleeding out," he supplies. "Steadily, if sluggishly."

"Woe is me," the bard sighs.

"May I turn you?"

"No."

"I'm going to turn you," Geralt decides anyway, so Jaskier resigns himself to it and struggles onto his forearms while the man pours over his plan of attack. "The ones in your leg are deep, it's likely you'll scar."

"Quite alright," the bard says. "Just means we'll match."

"Hmm."

"Geralt?"

"Yes?"

"Get on with it, dear."

"Right."

\--

"I think I'm going to leave," he breathes.

Roderick snorts from behind the lip of his glass. "So soon? Already have your eye on a some lass?"

"Oh ho-- Rich, my friend." Julian picks a loose thread from the embroidery adorning his shoulder. "I don't mean the _party._ Tonight I'm going to get sloshed-- maybe start a row with Marx. Bash the bastard over the head with a platter."

"You intend to resign?" The professor questions. "It hasn't even been a full year, your career--"

"I _intend,_ " he interjects, "to see this year through to its end. I can't stay here, Roderick. I'm good at this-- great, dare I say-- but this isn't what I want for myself. I don't think it ever was."

The older man furrows his brow. "What is it you want?"

Julian hums. "I can't rightly say," he relents. "I haven't a clue."

\--

"I'm trying to figure out what pleases me _._ " 

( _I think I've found it. I'm not sure._ )

_"_ We could head to the coast-- _"_

_\--_

Geralt fusses, and fusses, and _fusses._

( deposits him so delicately atop the bed roll that it hardly jostles him, and that in itself is something to marvel )

His wounds are dressed nicely and with great care ( he was dressed warmly in Geralt's shirt with a blanket draped across his lap, and the man had even thought to prop him up some against their belongings ), and he'd be endeared were he not so nervous _._ With nothing more to do, Geralt has taken to staring openly across the fire-- which is fine, really, but--

"If you leave me at the next village," he says, suddenly, "I will be very cross with you."

The Witcher laxens in posture, though it does nothing to dissipate the almost pained look he's adorned. The bard knows this song and dance by heart-- _I should have been faster. I should have seen, heard, smelled them a mile-- no, ten miles away. I should have been better, I could have been better, I--_

"I won't," he promises. "I won't."

Jaskier sighs, allows the knot that he hadn't realize wound in his heart fall slack. "Good. That's-- good. Great, actually."

"Does it not hurt?" Geralt asks-- though he does so so quietly that the bard almost loses it to the crackling of their fire.

"Hurt?" he echoes. "I suppose it does, yes."

The Witcher frowns.

It _does_ hurt. His whole body hurts from the strain of fighting against the pull of damned thing, his leg throbs ( and stings ) fierce enough that it dulls the pain in his hip.

"I've had worse," he says, eventually.

"No," Geralt says. "You haven't."

"I most definitely have," the bard argues.

The Witcher furrows his brows. "When?"

Jaskier raises his shoulder. "Had an unfortunate incident some years before I met you."

"What kind?" Geralt inquires. "You were a child when you met me."

"A _child?_ " He huffs. "It was, uh--" he shrugs. "Literacy-- among other things which were definitely my fault, though I maintain for a worthy cause-- was beaten well into me by crotchety old woman wielding a cane."

"Worse than this?"

"Ah," the bard mumbles. "Hmm. It was, um, like this. I was--"

Geralt hums and turns his gaze-- which, as enamored as he is, Jaskier finds himself grateful for. "You don't have to," he says. "I believe you."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> drowner; * slaps roof of jaskier * this bitch is food.


	46. The Druid's Witcher

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hoho! a chapter i dont hate, grand indeed

He was a man, once.

No. He was a _boy,_ once. 

An unruly shock of red hair, and eyes the sort of green that the leaves turn when dappled in sunlight-- or so he was told. The still water of the pond only revealed so much, and he hadn't cared much as it were.

He'd spend the mornings picking up bugs and turning them in his hands, other times collecting herbs with his mother. She'd teach him their names, what parts were useful and what parts to discard-- which plants were edible and which to avoid. He'd spend the afternoon in the kitchen; watching her grind petals into dust, strip stalks. He'd spend the evenings curled into her side. She would stroke his hair, murmur things in a tongue he couldn't decipher.

He was a boy, once-- the son of a druid, a healer and wielder of chaos-- but that was long ago.

"Geralt," she hums. The pads of her fingers are soft against his cheek, he leans into her touch. "My sweet boy. Take this and fetch us some water from the stream, will you?"

\--

Jaskier wakes, not for the first time in however many days ( well, that's an exaggeration-- its only been three; two in this inn, but it feels like a lifetime seeing as he's bedridden ), to a Witcher sprawled across him like a cat basking in the sun. Face tucked into the crook of his throat, arm fitted snuggly about his waist ( its paleness warmed by the sliver of light through their little window ).

It felt startlingly dreamlike each time ( although this is only the second time ), but that could be from any number of things. The coolness of Geralt's skin against his, a stark contrast to the summer's incessant heat. Perhaps the comfort of a promise kept; physical reassurance that he wasn't being left behind. It could be his palm catching on the fabric of his chemise as he slides his hand higher to rest against his chest. Jaskier thinks about how Letho could smell Geralt on him as it were; he wonders how unbearable it'd be now.

Geralt knows he's awake, undoubtedly-- and there's also no doubt that he himself has been awake for quite some time now, considering how early he liked to rise. It'd be a shame to break the silence, he really doesn't want to-- except he _desperately_ does, if the tremor in his fingers is anything to go by, so he compromises by thrumming them against the man's arm. Considering the suspiciously purr-like rumble that he can practically feel reverberating from the Witcher's chest, he thinks he made the right decision.

It helps some, anyhow; the contented burring of his companion filling in the gaping silence. Settles his disquiet, at least. Eases the urge to fill it with anything, everything and subsequently shattering their reprieve.

Geralt shifts again. His palm slides higher, his fingers brush his jaw in a manner that has his breath caught in his throat and then settles at his collar.

"Are you well?" The Witcher murmurs.

For a moment he thinks he's being asked after that rather embarrassing reaction, though there's no telling Geralt actually caught it-- but then he remembered his leg was practically mauled, so more plausibly he's asking after injuries, which--

"I am," he assuages. "Can't feel a thing lying down, at least-- Though I'd like to play again tonight, if you don't mind. I think it'll top me off."

Bemusedly, Geralt huffs. Jaskier has to agree.

However grateful he was, it was still rather disturbing to feel his skin knitting together ( incrimentally, that is-- he was hardly healed, but it was enough to settle the pain in the beginning and was nearly closed now ) by the conduit of his voice, courtesy of one _sentient_ _lute._ She sits in the chair at his bedside, now. Close enough that he could press his palm against her bodice if he wanted to.

"What of yourself?" The bard questions.

"Hmm," comes the Witcher's well-rehearsed answer.

"Hmm," Jaskier echoes. Hesitantly, he brings his hand up to rest against the one on his chest. "As much as I love deciphering those monosyllabic riddles of yours," he says, not unkindly, "I think I would like to know for certain one of these days, instead of assuming."

Geralt doesn't answer, which isn't much of a surprise, but he doesn't pull his hand away either-- though he does shift, bodily, to tuck Jaskier into him better, bury his face in his hair and settle the rumbling back into his chest.

Not for the first time, Jaskier's taken aback by Geralt's newfound tactile nature. Not that they hadn't already been touchy-- or he had, at least. He always enjoyed lathering up the man's hair, running his fingers through it, combing it, the works-- and also the monotonous task of ridding him from his armor, and other, much smaller, things like settling a hand on his shoulder, or rubbing his back soothingly. This, though, was startlingly intimate.

Although, he supposes, that is a matter of perspective. He wouldn't be surprised to find Geralt touch starved enough that the lines between platonic and romantic intimacy became blurred. In his case-- well, he knew what _he_ thought. What he felt. Maybe that made things worse, maybe he should--

"Jaskier," the Witcher mumbles. "You're thinking too much, stay here."

_Ah,_ he has been quiet-- and his companion is right, he does run the risk of getting lost in his own head. He swipes his thumb across the back of Geralt's palm.

"How is it that you're so cold?" He blurts.

Geralt huffs, albeit it sounds like a fond sort of huff. "Too cold?" He questions.

"Not at all," the bard reassures, though the implication that he could rectify it is curious. "I'll probably start sweating the moment we pull apart, just wondering how you aren't."

"The heart," Geralt says. "Slow the heart, slow the blood, cool the skin."

"I feel," the bard rebuffs, "that that could change any number of things. Not just the coolness of your skin."

The Witcher hums. "Good for battle. A slow heart makes a clear mind, no adrenal response to cloud it."

"Not just the big, obvious things, Geralt," he says. "For instance, under the average rate, your complexion might change. I reckon you'd be able to blush-- but also, not to mention, keeping it low for so long would be detrimental, wouldn't it? It--"

"The Trials changed many things in all of us," Geralt interrupts, quietly. "Granted us resilience, absolute control, resistance to some magicks. More changes, in my case, than control. At least in the beginning. Besides, you are warm enough."

\--

Eskel takes one look at him, with golden eyes wide and mournful, and turns his head. If he had the energy to do more than curl in on himself-- more than _breathe_ \-- he's burning from the inside out, though Vesemir had promised the worst of it had passed-- he might've looked the same ( the boy's warm brown eyes used to be a comfort; even that, he was denied-- but least the rest of him was there, the same soft features ).

Eskel comes back to him the next morning, pets his hair as she did, once-- "I'm sorry," he says. "I'm sorry." At the time, he thought it was the eyes.

Later he learns better. As he grapples on his tunic, he finds his own hands unfamiliar, the garment too tight around his shoulders; he stumbles like a fawn on new legs, cracks the hilt of a practice sword just by gripping it too tightly. The other boys eye him wearily-- some pitifully, some fearfully ( he can smell it, as much as they deny it ).

Kneeling beside a stream some evenings later, he buries a shaking hand into limp white locks. Even his brows-- even the patchy stubble adorning his jaw, white as fresh snow. The hair of his arms, his legs-- he hadn't noticed, couldn't bear to look, still can't.

There is nothing familiar about the amber-eyed boy peering back at him ( lithe and well muscled, yet so very wrong ), though he moves as he does.

\--

It was almost disconcerting watching Jaskier hobble down the stairs without an arm to steady him.

Actually, it was distinctly wrong; his calf was torn to strips, a chunk was ripped from his thigh-- the skin of his hip was flayed. The morning after, he'd gritted his teeth and asked only to play before they set off-- and play he did, well into the morning. By the time Geralt had finished packing their things, must to his horror, he'd found the bard stumbling to his feet.

"Look!" He'd exclaimed, brightly, arms thrown wide. "I suppose she's good for more than just looks!"

He takes a tentative step. Geralt had wrinkled his nose immediately at the sent of copper flodding the air as his calf tore open once more. The bard's knees wobbled, then gave out entirely. He falls to a kneel in the dirt.

"Oh," Jaskier bites. His disappointment smells distinctly like the morning dew that clings to autumn foliage; his acute discomfort sharp like citrus. Curious smells for a curious man. "Unfortunate. I suppose that wasn't enough."

"Not enough to walk," he agrees. "But enough to ease the discomfort of riding."

The bard seems to appreciate the sentiment, at least.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> jaskier, queer and yearning; this is nice
> 
> geralt, a himbo; yeah, you're warm. like a rock. in the sun.
> 
> jaskier; ah, okay
> 
> also, my birthday is in two days. i'm nervous. for what? i don't know because i don't do anything on my birthday, but turning nineteen seems...... formidable.


	47. The Sword In The Bramble

The Witcher shifts on his feet; twists the head of the relict in his grasp so that its antlers don't spear the lord-- a rather rounded, robust man in frankly, well-outdated clothes-- rushing past and dampen things further. The exposed bone knocks against the sword still sheathed to his back and jostles the rest that it's bound to, though the man pays it no mind. Geralt's gaze does not waver. He shifts again, following the noble's path across the parlor. The man hadn't even spared him more than a glance, too busy fauning over--

" _Julian_ , dear boy--" Who is some paces back, sopping wet and shivering despite huddling so close to the fireplace that he might as well _be_ on fire. "This won't do at all, will it?"

Geralt is in no mood for the lord's errant interests-- less so in _Jaskier_. He was _tired_ , waterclogged armor weighing him down and sticking to his skin uncomfortably. He'd lost a _sword_ to the beast, and most of their coin will likely go to a new one-- it sits there still, woven tightly into the branches of the Leshen's corpse ( In a last ditch effort, perhaps out of pure spite as he ran him through, the beast had _burst--_ or not burst, so much as erupt in all directions. A flurry of branches and bark with enough force to send him flying back into the foliage ). It would have taken hours to hack at it, and the risk of burning down the entirety of Brugge's forest was hardly worth smouldering it free with Igni.

The bard was oddly enamored by the sight; taking the blade, still frozen in parallel with the forest floor, by the hilt and giving a light yet entirely pointless tug. Geralt had allowed him this, if only because he had resigned himself to the blade's fate ( and maybe a little bit because the man had looked him with impossibly wide, pleading eyes ).

( He found it was worth it, too, when the bard slipped his hand from the grip and turned with the brightest of grins-- the sort of smile that lights up his entire person-- not just because it was a Witcher's sword, but it was _his._ " _What a tale this will be, my dear Witcher-- The Sword In The Bramble._ " )

The bard himself was likely feeling much the same, even if he hadn't done any of the actual fighting.

( " _Oh, Geralt._ " Jaskier takes him by the arm and they pause beneath the relict's canopy. " _It's raining._ " His skin tingles where the bard grips him, even through the leather braces. Soon enough, it pours. )

"What a miserable sight you make," his lordship sighs.

"Quite," Jaskier sniffs-- and Geralt must concede that while they weren't exactly covered in ichor they were rather out of sorts. "My Lordship--"

The noble smiles ( rather unpleasantly, Geralt thinks ) and lifts his hands as if to cup the bard's face, though he stops short an inch or so. "Please," he dismisses. "Let us not be strangers. Dion will do just as well."

Jaskier blinks, then lets out this sort of exasperated huff that lets him know just how tired he is. Nonetheless, he smiles-- and while it does crinkle his eyes it does not light them, and--

"Dion," the bard amends, pleasantly. "My companion and I have--"

"Worked yourself haggard, no doubt." The lord drops his hands back to his sides, nodding almost sympathetically. "Which is why I have taken it upon myself to accommodate you and..." He waves broadly, a clear enough implication.

Geralt takes a step toward them; then another-- this time the jostling does catch Dion's attention.

"Baths," he continues, lamely. "And... Warm meals. For you both. Along with--" The lord's smile turns terse as he meets the Witcher's eye-- "Rooms... Is he...?"

( " _Beast._ "

" _It'll bite, don't you know?_ "

" _Is he dangerous, Bard?_ " )

"Is he what?" Jaskier implores, flatly.

Really, Jaskier is an all around agreeable man-- but even agreeable men find their patience wears thin every now and again, and the bard was no exception to this. His tone startles them both to attention ( well, certainly not startle _him,_ but-- ) and the curl of his lip keeps them there. That being said, Jaskier's eyes are only for the noble before him.

"I ask again," the bard says. "Is he _what?_ "

Something turns in the pit of his stomach-- unpleasant, at the same time not. He ignores it in favor of moving again, crossing the parlor to stand behind the bard and lay his freed hand on his shoulder.

"My lord," he says. "We--"

"Have fulfilled our end of the contract," Jaskier interrupts. He waves a hand vaguely, a call for him to raise their prize, so he adhears and lifts the head for the lordship's viewing. "As you can very well see. Now, my companion and I have had a very long day, and I fear I may catch a cold were I to laze about in these clothes even a moment longer. I mean not to come off as impudent, my lord, for you have been naught but an utmost gracious host, but we have already procured a room at the village inn and I have great bardic duties to uphold, and so--"

"Coin," Geralt says.

Jaskier sniffs. "Please. My lord."

"Nonsense," says Dion, sutibly insulted yet mollified. "By which I mean of course, you will get your coin-- and more, for the trouble it has caused you and... your _fine_ companion."

"Ah," the bard sighs. "As I said, a most fair and gracious host, it--"

"I'll send a servant to collect your things."

"What," Geralt bites.

Jaskier elbows him-- and then hisses through a forced grin, because, really, what was he expecting to come of hitting an armored Witcher in the side?

"As lovely as it would be," the bard says, "to stay the night in this fine estate, I'm afraid we've already offered up a good sum of coin to our rooms--"

"Consider it reimbursed," says the lord, flippantly.

"But--"

"You're shivering, fair Julian--" and that is true enough, by the tremor beneath his fingers. "You'll catch a chill at this rate, I'm afraid I must insist."

Jaskier turns, smiling thinly, to meet his gaze.

_What do you say, dear friend? I, for one, would like to--_

Geralt blinks back at him, stonily.

_I think he is trying to bed you, and not only is it bothersome but it is irksome. But I like food. And warm baths. And coin, most of all. Also, you actually might catch--_

The bard closes his eyes and sighs. "Alright," he concedes.

Geralt too grunts his assent, though he knows the lord will not care to hear it, and shifts his hand to run lazily down Jaskier's arm. This side of him, at least ( the side closest to the flame ) had lost its chill, though not its dampness; neither had his hair, curling as it was at the edges. Dion smiles at them both ( though mostly at the bard, as it were ), in a rather obnoxious manner.

"Wonderful," he says. "I'll leave you both to wash up and rest. Perhaps we will dine together come morning-- and yes, Master Witcher, you will see your coin. I'll have it left with your things."

He says nothing. Jaskier, however, opens his eyes and smiles, softly, before turning back and offering his hand. The lord takes it, one part enamored and one part disgusted as if Jaskier were something like a dog, cute but filthy, and covers it gingerly with both of his own.

"You have my thanks, my lord," says the bard, earnestly, if not stiffly.

"Dion, fair Julian," the man corrects.

"Yes," says Jaskier, not bothering to correct himself. "Now," he turns to meet his eye as he pulls his hand free as politely as he can manage, and though his smile is tired it does reach him this time ( and he does his best not to think about that too much ), "my dear, let us soak this chill from our bones so that I might tend to your wounds."

Geralt almost says no-- his wounds will heal, his bruises and scrapes will fade overnight. Come morning he likely won't even have a strain to his muscles. Instead he nods, once.

"You first," he says.

"Nonsense," Dion interjects, "we have more than one--"

"The one will do just fine," Jaskier says. "I'd like to tend to his wounds as soon as I can-- it'll hardly be the first time we've shared. Isn't that right, my dear? Kill two-- maybe three-- birds with one stone, I say."

Geralt only sniffs, positive the bard knows what he's implying-- because Jaskier rarely says anything that he doesn't mean to say-- and only partly surprised by it, as he always was when such a situation presented itself.

The lord seems to have caught onto it as well, if the disgusted expression working to his face is anything to go by. He makes to speak, but Geralt moves, growing more impatient by each passing moment, and the trophy rattles at his side-- he squeezes Jaskier's shoulder lightly, then guides him a step father from the flame.

"Forgive us," the bard says, "its been a long day--"

"Who will guide us?"

"Geralt--"

"Mary," the lord says. The name hardly passes his lips before the maid slips through the parlor doors-- a slight and tired looking young woman. "She'll show you to your... room. And have food brought, as well."

"Very well," Geralt says, already moving ( and dragging the bard along with him ).

( " _Then the wilds, thoro' the woods they went,_

_on every sidè shear;_

_The Wolf, thoro' the grevès he glent,"_

The bard, though thoroughly soaked and undoubtedly exhausted, flits about like a bird as he sings-- and somehow the rain does nothing to take away from his voice.

_"For to slay, himself, that ghastly deer--_

_Ho! Lo and behold, as 'twere not a deer at all!"_ )

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ending song, in part, from "the ballad of chevy chase".
> 
> the wild -- game
> 
> shere -- several
> 
> thoro' the greves he glent -- through the groves, he darted
> 
> 'twere -- it were
> 
> thank you all for the birthday wishes!! i am now a year older-- i shall reward myself for making it by another year with unhealthy amounts of coffee!


	48. To Wash A Songbird

The bard, for his love of baths, looks increasingly reluctant as he peels off his doublet.

"It'll do you good," Geralt says, quietly. "If not keep you from getting sick, it will at least ease the soreness of your muscles."

"Soreness?" Jaskier echoes questioningly, though he seems placated enough to discard his chemise and begin on his trousers. "You say that like I'm the one who's banished some great beast."

The Witcher hums. "It was a long trek. Barely stopped."

"Well worth it."

"Was it?" He questions.

Jaskier smiles and waves for him to turn— so he does, despite there being no point, turning and instead focusing on the buckles of his armor as the bard sheds his small clothes and sinks into the bath. "I'd say so," he continues. "Fantastic, even— the Leshen was nothing short of ethereal, albeit in a terrifying sense, but you were utterly magnificent, as usual. I'll toy with it for a while, but I've already got—"

"I know," Geralt says, not unkindly. "You sung parts as we left." He isn't sure he'll ever get used to the man singing his praises— or singing of him in general.

"Not to your liking?"

"Contrary," he finds himself saying— and he notes how the bard shifts, likely lifts his head; so he shucks his chest piece and turns to sit on the bath's edge. Jaskier's head is held aloft, as he thought, peering curiously from where he sits chest deep in the steaming water. "You sing well. I've never had qualms with your talents, only the... exaggeration."

The bard flushes deeply, though whether from the heat of the water or the budding compliment is unclear. Geralt, as he turns to rid himself of his boots, begins to wonder if he'd ever praised the man's efforts before. Guiltily, he recognizes that he likely hasn't— and that is surely a pity, because the bard _has_ made a name for himself, and as his barker has made a world of a difference, none of which would've come about had the young man not poured his very soul into each of his works.

"Will you not join me?" Jaskier questions, suddenly. 

Geralt fumbles with his boot, then turns. "Huh?"

"What?" The bard inquires, blinking owlishly. "I just— I could, er— comb your hair, and such. I figured since the bath is more than big enough to suit us, and it isn't as if we haven't—"

"Alright."

"Huh?" Echoes the bard. "I mean— Yes, grand— er, fine, good. Yes."

This time, Jaskier turns to distract himself with the array of soaps while also giving him some semblance of privacy— as if he hasn't seen Geralt nude a multitude of times by now. He is as fond as he is bemused, and decides not to comment on it. Instead he focuses on fumbling off his trousers and small clothes, then focuses on the heat of the water against his chilled skin as he lowers himself in. It isn't nearly as hot as he'd like— if it had been, the bard wouldn't have been able to stand it— but it warms him just the same.

Jaskier was right, as it were, about the size of the tub. A solid few inches remained between them, though the man, looking rather intensely at the display of products before him, was well within arm's reach.

"Who's he trying to impress," the bard wonders aloud, "with this intensive collection of soaps?"

Geralt hums, observes as his companion plucks one of the bottle and sniffs at it, then reaches with his other hand to do the same with another, and—

"What are these?" The Witcher asks, tentatively, as he reaches out to touch a scar at the man's shoulder— then another, or as it turns out upon closer inspection, _o_ _thers,_ rather faint, trailing down his back.

The bard stiffens ( Geralt can feel it as much as he hears his breath catch; as much as he sees the other's grip tighten on the bottles ) but it lasts hardly a moment. He pulls back regardless, because he should've known better than to ask after some scarring, of all things.

Jaskier swallows, then places one of the soaps back and turns.

"I've told you," he says. "Some years before we met, I had a sort of incident."

"You," Geralt responds, unthinkingly. "The lord." He pauses at the bard's furrowing brow. "He's impressing you— trying to. With his soaps."

Jaskier hums, thoughtfully; the furrow of his brow dissipates as he turns the bottle in his hands. "I suppose so," he concedes.

"He was," the Witcher maintains. "Is. Very obviously."

"And?" Jaskier muses. "What do you think of our most gracious host?"

He thinks the lord is strange. And untoward, and— "Not gracious."

"He's given us sanctuary," the bard points out. "Promised us food, and coin— and then more coin."

"He's trying to court you."

Jaskier wrinkles his nose. "Court me?" He questions. "Bed me, certainly— that, or looking to buy my company— but not _court_ me."

"Excessive," Geralt says. "Just for a chance to bed a man."

"I should be flattered, I suppose," the bard muses. "To be sought after enough that I'm spoiled."

The Witcher hums, then repositions himself enough to sink lower into the water and rest his head back against the tub's edge. "You enjoy it?"

"Attention?" The bard quips, cheerily. "Certainly."

"A given," he retorts, despite the other's indignant muttering. "I meant— do you enjoy it now? By this lord's hand?"

Jaskier pauses enough to lather some soap and set to scrubbing at his arms— and then gives a thoughtful hum. "I suppose," he says. "Not that I have any intention of _actually_ bedding him— I do have some standards. However, if he jips us on coin—"

"We move on," he interrupts. "You aren't dishing yourself out for coin, Jask."

"It's a lot of coin," the bard points out.

"No."

"Alright," Jaskier relents. "Don't go brooding about it on me when it happens."

"I won't." He will.

"Of course," says the bard, kindly. Geralt watches, head tilted, as he continues scrubbing lethargically— as he misses his arm entirely and then hums, as if he's surprised, and he pulls himself up again.

"May I?" He offers-- though, really, he takes the rag without waiting on the man's response. The bard doesn't fight it, although whether that's because he he's too tired to recognize it or just doesn't care is beyond him. "Turn."

He does so, thoughtlessly ( it strikes him, not for the first time, how wholly the bard puts his trust in him, and settles tightly in his throat ), turns his back and leans to rest on the tub's edge as Geralt shifts and sets to scrubbing lightly at his shoulders— ( his upper arms, his back— ) and this is something new; he's never done this before, its always been the other way around. The bard lies his head atop his arms and, fearing he might just fall asleep, the Witcher makes a request.

"Sing?"

Jaskier hums, both pleased and at a loss. "What shall I sing for you, Master Witcher?"

"Anything."

"Anything, eh?"

"Just to hear you," he says.

"Hm." Jaskier flushes again— Geralt hears it in the way his heart picks up, rather than see it spread across his cheeks. The bard is quiet a moment longer as he repositions himself so that his chin is resting against his arms, rather than his cheek. "Very well."

The bard sucks in a breath— "Ooh—"

"No."

" _Fishmonger—_ "

" _No_ ," he says again.

The bard grins over his shoulder— _Anything,_ it says. "Oh fishmonger; Come quell your daughter's hunger—"

"Jaskier."

"To pull on my horn, as it rises in the morn; For tis naught but bad luck—"

Grimacing, the Witcher resigns himself to the rendition and pours all his focus into counting the many freckles across the bard's back as he scrubs it.

"To fuck with a puck; Lest your grandkid be born a hairy young faun; Bleating and braying all day, hey ho!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> jaskier, a would-be sugar baby; how do you know what’s good for me??
> 
> geralt, tired, confused, hating on dion; thaTs my oPiniOn!!


	49. Master Witcher of the Liberal Arts

Jaskier clears his throat. Again. His knee won't stop bouncing and he has a terrible headache having nothing to do with the night prior and everything to do with the anxious fluttering of his heart, and-- last night was definitely something.

He lifts a hand to his collar and tugs it-- because that's something he can do now ( and also because he can't quite seem to settle his nerves ), and if the lord across from him has any qualms with it he can go squabble over it with other nobility. It must be nice to live a life so lackluster that the sight of a disgruntled bard ruins your breakfast. He tugs at it one last time before his hand is stolen from him entirely, dragging his attention with it.

Geralt's hand is cold, as it often is, even though it's positively sweltering today.

"Unbutton it," he says.

Jaskier wrinkles his nose. "That's indecent."

"And walking around with your chest bared isn't?" The Witcher tuts. _Tuts._ While Jaskier himself has been stumbling somewhat out of sorts ever since he dressed for breakfast, Geralt has managed to find himself in an undeniably good mood.

"You aren't a lord," he points out.

"Still indecent, I'd wager."

"I'll be sure to tie up my chemise for you from now on," he offers, "so as not to offend."

At that, Geralt makes a peculiar face. Instead of mulling over the it, he reaches out with his free hand to take up his drink.

\--

He'll admit, whether the Witcher has deigned to warm or cool himself, there is always a severe contrast between their bared skin. Not that the man's flesh is _burning,_ but the warmth of his calloused palm across his back lingers far longer than it should-- and the feel of it tugging through his hair ( not roughly, or with an ulterior motive, like others ) somehow leaves an odd, though not unwelcome, feeling in the pit of his stomach.

"I could do this myself," he offers. Not that he really wants to.

Geralt only hums his acknowledgment before bringing a hand around to guide his head back, so that he can wash out the soap.

\--

"So," Dion muses. "A noble gone bard."

Jaskier nearly winces. Already, far too much has been said.

"I wasn't made for nobility," he offers.

"No one is _made_ for nobility," the lord argues. "It's a gift."

Jaskier disagrees, but he hums noncommittally and reaches up to tug at-- and then settles his hand back down ( so much for sticking it to the man ), because Lord Dion has taken to stare straight into his soul.

"Why, then," the lord inquires, "take up such a diminished path?"

"Hardly diminished," he argues. "I was a professor, first."

Geralt shifts beside him, and it dawns on him that this is likely the first time he's hearing of it. He knows he studied at Oxenfurt, and that he returns by the end of every summer for the Annual Bardic Competition-- except this year, that is-- and he _also_ knows that he's of nobility, of a sort; that he hails from Kerack. He reaches for his drink again-- it's just juice, anyway.

"A waste, no? A master of the seven liberal arts sunk to wandering the Continent."

"Sunk?" He questions, incredulously. "Only some weeks ago I was hosued under the Duchess of Toussaint herself. I resigned my position at Oxenfurt, yes, but I am still very much a _Master._ I return regularly to give guest lectures and attend the annual competitions-- not to mention that I do well enough in the courts for you to recognize me outright."

"True enough," Dion relents. "Though wandering the Continent as you do is hardly safe. There was a myriad of paths for you to take."

Jaskier wrinkles his nose. "What a poor excuse for a dialectic this is-- you are entirely missing my point. If I must sacrifice my safety-- not to mention my _security_ \-- for a chance at _truly_ living, that is a sacrifice I would gladly make a hundred times over."

\--

"When did you teach?"

"Before we met. Not long, only a year."

"Nobility?"

"Minor nobility, again, before we met-- though I took it up for a few months after our quarrel."

"What kind?"

"Viscount."

"Of?"

"Lettenhove, in Kerack."

Geralt huffs from his perch in Roach's saddle. "That's why I couldn't find you."

Jaskier had expected this, to an extent-- though not exactly the barrage of questions. "Apologies, my friend. I didn't exactly tell anyone where I was going."

"Don't apologize," Geralt reprimands. "Master of the Arts?"

"I prefer Master Bard," he says, "but my official title is rather extensive. Master is just a chunk."

"What is it?"

"Honorable Julian Alfred Pankratz, Master of the Seven Liberal Arts, former Vicount de Lettenhove."

"A mouthful," the Witcher concedes. "What are they?"

Jaskier hums, questioningly. "What are what?"

"The arts."

Oh. "Well," he says. "The seven liberal arts are divided into two groups, one of three and one of four. The first of the two would be Trivium-- the three literary diciplines; grammatics, dialectic and rhetoric. The second would be Quadrivium, four diciplines of mathematics-- one of which I am sure you are already comfortably familiar with at its base; astronomy-- then arithmetic, geometry and music."

"I understand very little of what you just said," the Witcher admits, sheepishly. "But yes, I know how to navigate by the stars."

"I wouldn't expect you to. They aren't easy, most study them well into adulthood."

"But you're a master?" Geralt questions.

"Yes."

"Since before we met?"

"Yes," he says again.

"What is dialectic?" The word tumbles oddly from his tongue, obviously misplaced, and he spares him a glance, brows drawn. "You mentioned that one earlier, over breakfast."

"Are you interested in the arts, Geralt?" He retorts, bemusedly. "Not that I'm opposed, just surprised."

"No." Geralt lilts his head some, then resumes his previous position so that he might keep watch of their surroundings. "You are," he says.

Jaskier raises a brow-- not that his companion can see it-- and diverts his gaze to the path before him. "Dialectic," he begins, "is an argument. A spiral, of sorts. One makes a statement, the other acknowledges it-- whether they agree or not-- and makes a statement of their own, and then it moves back to the first and so on. The point of a dialectic is to come to a better understanding, or arrive at the truth of something, through rational talk."

"Mutual understanding. But he wasn't listening."

"No," the bard says. "He was not. Without acknowledging the faults in your reasoning and truths in the other, or at the very least considering them, the spiral inverts-- you end farther from a conclusion than you've begun. What you must know of dialectics, there are only these three things; firstly, everything has an opposing force. Secondly, through gradual change, you must, at some point, reach a turning point or conclusion. Thirdly, change moves in a spiral, not a circle. Each party must be willing to challenge what they know, otherwise it goes nowhere."

"And you know this," Geralt says. "And practice it. That is why you are the master and he isn't."

Jaskier mulls over this, fiddling with the cuff of his chemise's sleeve ( he'd discarded his doublet some hours ago due to the unrelenting heat ). "I believe," he says, finally, "that everyone knows it; only that some are more aware than others. It's that moment where you bargain for more coin and are rejected-- when you realize these talks are getting you nowhere because they just won't hear it. In putting dialectics to practice, from a practical-- as opposed to academic-- standpoint, I know whether to continue or save my breath."

A moment of relative silence passes ( the clopping of hooves, the crunch of dirt beneath the soles of his boots; flitting birds and rustling leaves ), wherein he spares the Witcher a glance and finds the man drawn, though lax in posture. He rolls his shoulders and fiddles with his mare's reins, all while focusing on the path ahead.

"You mean to discredit yourself," the Witcher says, eventually. "There is a difference between knowing in theory and to put things to practice as they were meant to be. The lord may know of these practices, but, as you said, is unwilling to learn. You have seen me wield a sword, this does not mean you can stave off a beast."

"That is true enough," Jaskier agrees. "So what, then, is to be a master? To know and to put to practice as intended?"

"To know, practice, and to be willing to learn beyond it?" Geralt offers.

"Then are you not a master of dialectic?" Jaskier points out. "You know, practice, and are willing to learn."

"Ah," the Witcher says, casting the bard a glance. "The change."

"And with it, a better understanding," he says. "We started this so that you might better grasp the concept, I would wager that you have."

Geralt studies him a moment longer, then leverages his gaze elsewhere. "Hmm."

Jaskier smiles, turning his attention back to the path and the cuffs of his sleeves. "Aptly put, my dear."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> geralt, on the inside; i have been forced to think with my own brain. i am feeling attacked.
> 
> geralt, on the outside; hmm.


	50. Death to the Fishmonger

"Geralt," he whines.

The Witcher at his side pays him no mind, which is completely fair. They hadn't even been walking more than an hour before Jaskier was covered in a fine sheen of sweat, hair sticking obnoxiously to his forehead, and he's been complaining on and off since then. Reasonably, he knows that if they don't make good pace it'll just add on to the time he has to suffer on the heat of the road, but even discarding his outermost layers ( namely his doublet, as he had for the last few days now ) has done nothing to ease up the heat.

"Geralt," he sighs again.

"Hmm."

"I'm dying."

"No."

"I am," he pouts. "I feel gross. I'm going to die here."

Geralt offers him a fleeting glance. "Hmm."

Alright, maybe he isn't going to die-- it's not like he's exhausted or dying of thirst-- but it certainly feels like a near thing.

\--

"I need your help."

" _Oh,_ " he breathes. "My dear, look at you-- come in, come sit."

" _Jaskier,_ " she huffs. Fiery, she's always been so fiery. Bullheadedness coupled with cutting glares ( so much like him-- and so much like _her_ ). "There's no time. I need--"

"The sooner you sit," he interrupts, "the sooner we get a meal and drink in you, you can tell me what's going on."

She grimaces-- an expression poised exactly like the man she'd stolen it from-- but knows she's been beat. She's stubborn, he's stubborn, but there's none more persuasive ( or more insistent ) than him. "Fine," she relents. "But you must listen. No questions, no interruptions. There is no time-- even less than that."

"Of course. There's no better listener than me." He smiles, brightly, in an attempt to bleed the tension from her shoulders-- and her visage softens. Then twists. Her lip trembles despite the will against it.

" _Jaskier,"_ she whimpers ( and that's all _him_ ).

"Oh," he sighs. "My darling girl."

\--

"She never returned to me," Jaskier worries one night-- and it's odd that he should worry at all, because-- "Yennefer, I mean." They had never gotten along, though it seems now that there was an odd sort of truce between them.

Geralt pauses in his ministrations at this ( at her, to no one's surprise ), whetstone three-fourths of the way down his blade. He says nothing, though Jaskier can hear his questions in the air between them.

"She visited," is all he says. "Twice, after the mountain-- it was increasingly peculiar each time. I worried. After Cintra, I left-- but Sodden followed. I know I shouldn't have-- as much as I loathe to admit it, she's bloody brilliant-- but there was something different."

Geralt hums. Resumes passing the whetstone across the edge of his blade in steady sweeps.

"She is alive," the Witcher manages. "But you know this."

"I do. I just--"

"Set Sodden Hill ablaze. The chaos consumed her, in turn."

"But she is well?" He asks. "I mean, of course she is, you left Cirilla with her. I suppose it would've been... nice to hear from her, is all. Alleviate my worries."

"Healing," Geralt offers as he turns his blade. "She was blinded. Not anymore."

"Good," he exhales, earnestly. "That's--"

"You didn't sleep with her."

Jaskier blinks, then wrinkles his nose incredulously and allows his head to thunk back against the tree he's leaning against. " _No._ " He lowers his gaze again almost immediately, almost startled to meet Geralt's gaze across their shoddy little camp. "That is the second time you've asked. I did not bed your witch."

Geralt frowns. "Yennefer--"

"Is not your witch," the bard interrupts, flippantly. "I'm well aware. It's the other way around. I've no doubt she does the pegging, too."

"Jaskier."

"Frankly," he continues, "it's disturbing that you'd think I would _want_ to sleep with the woman who sent my best friend on a _rampage_ that destroyed years of my work, on top of the fact--"

"Jaskier," the Witcher sighs.

"-- that she threatened to cut off my _balls_ over a djinn that wasn't mine to begin with. I don't know what you're into, and _frankly_ \--"

" _Bard--_ "

"Do not _'Bard'_ me, Geralt," he chides. "Deny it all you want-- you do not love her, you have no wants-- it does not matter. You _ensured it._ I was there for it all, you absolute _fool_ of a man. One could almost taste the magic in that blasted tavern-- you were _entranced._ You were lost to me as soon as she passed the threshold."

For once, Jaskier sees fit to let the silence fester between them. He occupies himself gazing up into the canopy as Geralt sheaths his blades and moves instead to stoke the fire.

"I'll fix it."

The bard frowns, half-sure he's hearing things and at the same time knowing fully well that he isn't.

_Fix what?_ He'd like to say. What's done is done-- for all he knows, a wish cannot be broken; and even if one could revoke a wish, why would he? Even if he did, it would change nothing.

Instead, he sighs.

"Of course, dear."

\--

"A little while longer," the Witcher maintains.

"What difference will it make?" He argues. "It'll be just as hot in the next village-- not to mention the heat and stink of overworked village folk."

"It'll get you a cool bath." Geralt lifts his shoulders once, in a vague shrug, as he reaches over to pat Roach's shoulder. "Chilled ale, perhaps. Farther north, closer to your cities-- and the mountains, where it is far cooler."

"True enough," he relents, with a huff. A cool bath would be welcome indeed.

The Witcher smiles-- or offers the closest he can to one. A pleasant look on him, regardless. It used to be a sparse one, dished out by the dying light of a fire, or the closest he could be to inebriated without draining their purses dry, but these days it seemed to happen more. He offers one in turn, wondering what struck such a change, but decides not to dwell on it too much. Instead he turns his gaze to the foliage as he reaches up to push the hair from where it sticks to his forehead.

It's surprising, to say the least, when Geralt bumps their shoulders together and nearly sends him stumbling off the path.

"Sorry," the Witcher says as he rights him, but the apology is offset by the widening grin settling there. "Making sure you're still there."

Jaskier raises his brows, making a show of dusting off his shoulder as if something dirty had touched it-- which isn't far off in anycase, as his companion was dirty at the best of times-- to which Geralt rolls his eyes and turns.

"Much appreciated," he says, "but I am still very much a feeble, easily broken human; and you, as it happens, are made of rock. You'll knock me into the brush, keeping that up. I could always sing you a song--"

"No."

"No?" The bard leans forward to catch his gaze ( and _grin_ \-- Melitele's sake-- twenty years and he's never seen the man smile so freely ) under his. "Why ever not?"

"Because," Geralt says, resolutely avoiding eye contact. "We both know you'll start again with--"

"Ooh fish--"

" _Jaskier._ "

"--monger, oh fishmon--"

It happens in half a beat, really. Geralt drops the mare's reins and turns quick enough that Jaskier is hopeless to evade the hand coming up to cover his mouth, or the one wrapping around to settle between his shoulders so that he can't step away. He settles for taking the Witcher by his wrist and raising his brows-- and most certainly doesn't expect for Geralt to lean in; to press their foreheads together, to--

"No more Fishmonger," he pleads.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> geralt, himbo; wow. this is my best friend. he makes me so happy, it's crazy-- i've never felt feelings like this before. i was so blind before the mountain. i wonder what this is.
> 
> jaskier, the oblivious fool; i have never seen this man smile before ever. i am scared. maybe a-little-bit-a-lot in love. i wonder, on this trek with just the two of us, who he is thinking about to make him so happy. probably yen--


	51. Elihal and the Erratic Bard

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> longer than usualll. i'm trying to get better at writing more-- and also, i'm kinda proud of this chapter in more ways than one. hope you enjoy!

Jaskier pokes his head through the doorframe with narrowed eyes and Elihal follows suit, albeit bemusedly, pressing up against him and sticking their own head out curiously. Together they scan the room-- not that there's much to it. A rickety bed, a tub, a rack of fabrics, a chest and drawers, a drafting desk. Nothing in particular stands out, and he notes how the bed is far too low for anyone to squeeze under.

"Buttercup," says the elf, sweetly, their voice lilting in amusement. "This is a two room shop, we're the only one's here. I've never known you to be shy, in any case." They run a hand up his back in a placating gesture, stopping to squeeze just barely at his neck, and the bard tilts his head back onto their chest with a little huff.

Elihal chuckles at his antics ( or, more-so the pout adorning his lips ), and then pulls back. They wave their arms about in a clear enough indication to hurry along, so he relents and follows farther into the shop while the tailor sets about gathering their things.

They settle into a sort of companionable almost-silence, softened by the bard's near erratic humming and the rustling that accompanies the elf in their ministrations.

"These pieces are just fine," they observe. "I suppose, if you would like the bodice to--"

"Do you know of Kalkstein?" The bard interrupts, suddenly. "I heard some time ago that he'd left Vizima for Novigrad, set up shop--"

Elihal takes a step back and raises a brow. "The alchemist?"

"Yes, exactly, Adalbertus-- the alchemist," Jaskier affirms with a nod.

"I heard he's crazy," muses the elf. "What ever could you want with an alchemist? Is it your glamour? I'm not sure he'd be able to do anything for it, you look just as well to me."

Affronted, the bard draws his brows. "My _what?_ No-- I don't even--" He waves a hand dismissively. "Kalkstein is... an old friend. _Ish_. He knows Geralt, somewhat. I figured--"

"That he'd dish up a nice story for you?" They supply, tapping their pencil against their lip.

Jaskier blinks, then draws a hand over his face and softens, both in posture and expression. "Yes," he says again. "Exactly right. I've told you, I'm sure, my dear old friend-- as much as I... as _fond_ as I am-- he is an absolute rubbish storyteller."

"Yes," muses the tailor. "What was it? Gruff and monosyllabic, with a--"

" _Yes_ ," the bard blurts. "Yes. In any case, Kalkstein--"

The elf smiles pleasantly and at the same time inclines his head. "You'll want to find him before the hunters round on him. He used to neighbor with one of the Vivaldis back in Vizima, did he not? Perhaps Vimmie or Dudu know better of his whereabouts."

"Elihal," he sighs, though he has a plethora of questions bubbling at the back of his mind. "My darling, my fair friend, I could kiss you." And he does, in fact, make good on this promise-- raising himself some to plant a kiss solidly on each of the tailor's cheeks-- to which the elf laughs, brightly.

He'd been meaning to talk with the doppler, in any case. They--

Elihal clears their throat.

"Anyhow," they interrupt, waving vaguely to his person. "What is this about? I see no reason to make adjustments; in fact I remember sewing this garment together only a fortnight past." They reach up to smooth the fabric against the bard's chest. "If you stopped by only to talk, you could have just said so."

"I suppose I could've," he admits, sheephishly. "I apologize, my friend. Quite a lot is going on at the moment."

"Your brothel?"

"My _cabaret,_ " the bard corrects with a huff. "Although, yes, among other things. I believe I've found a way to procure a tidy loan-- and not from the Vivaldis, either-- but--" He folds his arms over his chest, sighing. "It must wait. There are far more pressing matters that I must attend to."

The elf hums, then waves their pencil about. "Pressing matters," they reaffirm. "Such as gathering a tale from Novigrad's mad alchemist."

Jaskier smiles thinly and opts to clap them on the arm, to which they raise their brows.

"I will return, Elihal," he says, to which the elf then frowns. "But as a matter of fact, I have another urgent matter to attend to."

\--

"You can't come with me."

"Of course I can. If Geralt--"

"He'd go mad if anything happened to you," she says, matter-of-factly, but not unkindly. "Myself as well, I suppose, but the both of us?"

"My dear, I am well on in my years. You may not think of me as... anything--"

"Jaskier, that isn't--"

"In any case," he interrupts, "I have more experience under my thumb than I'd care to admit, and besides that _I_ set up this meeting. We will go together, or I will go on my own."

" _Jas--_ "

\--

"I do not understand," Geralt admits, "how you always manage to work yourself up so thoroughly over a city."

Jaskier throws out his arms, beaming widely at the man atop his steed. "It isn't _just_ a city!" He counters. "It's _Oxenfurt_. I have--"

_"I have friends here."_

_"No, you don't."_

"I'm not sure I ever told you," he admits, cutting off his own spiel. "You have sanctuary among the academy."

"Huh?" The Witcher huffs, almost incredulously.

"Were you to find yourself in the area, in need of housing, or a place to lie low, I suppose--"

"Why?"

"Why?" The bard echoes, raising a brow. "I requested it, of course. You will be accomodated, should you need it. I understand that you don't exactly like the city, but--"

"Thank you."

Jaskier blinks, taking a moment to fiddle with the strap of his satchel. "Huh?"

"Thank you," the Witcher says, again.

"Oh," he says, absently. "Of course, my dear. You're very welcome."

Geralt nods, once, face softening. "What is it, then?" He asks, after a moment. "About Oxenfurt?"

"Well," the bard muses, thoughtfully, "I suppose one could say it's the closest I have to a home. My colleagues-- well, aside from Professor Engerran- aren't too fond of me, but--"

"Why?"

Jaskier shrugs lightly, then kicks out at a little stone ( and effectively scuffs his boot in the process, much to his dismay ). "I did nothing," he says. "I was... young. Graduated from the university at nineteen, while what would have been my peers would spend a solid handful more years studying; acquired my title and became a professor myself at twenty."

"Your... incident," Geralt interjects. The bard can feel the heat of his gaze upon the side of his face, but he continues to stare at the path before him. "This also happened within that time?"

"Yes," he says, shortly. "Some months before I graduated. As it were, my professors took my own academic excellence as a threat to both their intelligence and pride-- and in being so young, I was well alienated from my academic peers. Through graduating, not only did I become the youngest professor in Oxenfurt's history but I ended up teaching students that were my age, none of which took me seriously."

"Because you were young," Geralt reflects. "They underestimated you."

"Everyone does," the bard states in passing. "I won my students over in the end. Fell in love with each and every one of them, in much the fatherly sense, and their devastation upon hearing of my resignation absolutely broke my heart, but I knew I needed to go. I promised to return to lecture every now and again-- it's a marvel, every time, how the hall fills up."

"You are well liked." Geralt states this like a fact, surprisingly, while shifting some in the saddle. Roach whinnies and tosses her head if telling him to cease, so he settles and turns his gaze elsewhere. "This is no surprise."

Jaskier hums, even if he doesn't particularly agree. A lot of people tolerated him, some could even appreciate his abilities, but that didn't necessarily mean he was a well liked man. He's flighty; absentminded at both the best and worst of times-- not to mention he can't keep quiet to save his life ( or keep still, for that matter ).

Some moments later, the Witcher shifts again and pulls his steed gently to a halt. The bard stops and spares him a glance, only to find him sporting a rather conflicted expression, but before he has the chance to ask after him, the man speaks.

"Green," he says. Which-- well, Jaskier isn't sure what he was expecting, if he was expecting anything at all.

"Green?" He echoes.

"My eyes," Geralt clarifies, gaze downcast. The man takes a fistful of his mare's mane-- doesn't pull, just holds her, perhaps in an act of reassurance. "They were green. And my hair, it was red. And... curly. I looked-- I think... much like my mother. I'm-- they did more. To me. In the trials. I was not a grand Witcher, it was all I could do to survive, but I took well to the Trial of Grasses. First, took my eyes, as they did to us all-- made us less than human. Then they subjected me further. Made me... more. Worse. Than my brothers. Took the color from my hair. My skin."

His first thought is to apologize, but, somehow, that doesn't seem right-- he has the sinking realization that he is likely the first person Geralt has confided in in such a manner, and would rather not be seen to pity him. Instead he loosens his hold from the strap of his bag and reaches up to press his hand against the man's knee.

"Look at me, please?"

The Witcher works his jaw, gaze slipping from the mane intertwined with his fingers to the hand settled upon his knee, but does, eventually, oblige.

"I see you," the bard says.

And there's nothing but truth in it-- Jaskier is nothing if not a man of wild imagination, and he gives thought to Geralt's features; to unruly red hair and lively green eyes. It suits him, he thinks. A man he could find himself falling in love with all over again, and-- _fuck._

Jaskier swallows thickly. "I see you," he says again, cursing the pounding of his heart. "As you are and as you were, and both are equally as lovely. They didn't make you any less of a man. I would know. I've seen you since the day we met-- why would I be here, otherwise, if not for you?"


	52. Solidarity of Witcherses and Trollses

"Witcherses," beckons a gravelly voice.

"Yes," Geralt calls, feebly. He straightens, feels about behind him, palms at the front of Eskel's leather armor in an effort to keep him and, by extention, Mikal back within the cave's mouth. "We are Witchers."

"What are you doing?" The boy whispers.

"You make trek," the voice calls.

"We do," he affirms. "We must get to the Circle of Elements."

" _Geralt_ \--" breathes Eskel.

He doesn't know what he's doing. How could he know? "It speaks," he murmurs. "If it speaks, it can be reasoned with-- it--"

Mikal takes a step forward and past him, weapon drawn, and Geralt abandons Eskel in favor of stupidly grappling at the sword in his brother's hand. It doesn't work; the other boy is bigger, faster. He knicks his hand on the blade and fumbles, settles for turning his back on the beast and putting himself between them.

_"Never," says Master Vesemir. "Never turn your back."_

" _Geralt_ ," Mikal spits. "It is a beast. A _monster."_

"It is a _troll,_ " he hisses, fiercely-- as fiercely as a boy of fourteen can manage. "It _speaks._ It does not mimic. It does not trick. There is willfulness."

The ground _quakes._ Still, he does not turn.

"More of them," says Eskel. His amber eyes flash nervously. "Three, together. We will not survive them. I say--"

"We could have," Mikal argues, venomously. The grip on his weapon is tight enough to whiten his knuckles. "We could have taken just the one."

Eskel looks skeptical, to say the least, even as he keeps his eyes trained forward. Geralt shakes his head resolutely. "There is no need to shed blood," he insists. "There never was. You say they are monsters, yet they do not attack us whilst we squabble amongst ourselves. Sheath your sword."

"You are _mad,_ " Mikal seethes. "I will not die here because of you."

"Their hide is of _rock,_ " he bites back. "Your weapon is useless, and you are rubbish at casting. Either your bones will be snapped like twigs beneath the heal of a boot, you will run back into the cave like a coward, or you will _trust me_ and sheath your weapon."

Mikal opens his mouth again-- 

"These mountain," interrupts the troll. "These rock, our."

"Yes," Geralt agrees, gaze unwavering from his brother. "Your mountain. Your rocks. We do not want them."

Eskel steps forward and reaches out. Encircles Mikal's wrist gently. Geralt breathes again and turns, slowly.

The troll and its companions are, frankly, hideous-- as most monsters are-- and smell-- Melitele's shit, do they smell-- even from yards away. "No want?" It questions, skeptically.

"No," he reassures. "We want only to make our trek to the circle, as I said. Then we will leave."

"Witcherses," counters another, "troll kill."

Geralt parts his lips-- there is a click of a sword settling in its sheath, a twig snaps behind him.

"Witchers kill bad monsters," Mikal retorts. "Are you bad?"

"Bad?" Says the first. "No, no bad here."

The third straightens some. "No monster, too. Only troll."

"No monster," the second agrees. "Smash. Dead, monster. No bad, neither."

"Good," Geralt sighs, and his relief is almost palpable. He hops from one foot to another in anticipation. "Does this mean you will let us pass? We will not hurt you, nor will we touch your rocks."

"Nor," echoes the second. It turns toward the first. 

"Nor," agrees the first, nodding sagely. It waves to the path behind it. "You go. And then you go... other. To home."

"Other, to home," the third repeats. Then it turns and begins lumbering over the bend-- presumably toward its home. He takes this as permission to press forward, carefully skirting around the first troll with Eskel close at his heel.

"To home," Mikal mutters, somewhat placatingly, and follows.

\--

"Thank you!" Jaskier says, inclining his head. "I... love it."

"Hmm."

Geralt watches him gingerly turn the dagger in his hand; obviously he's waiting for some other type of reaction, or maybe calling his bluff. Not that he isn't exceedingly appreciative, or touched by the thought, it's just-- He smiles, softly, if a bit tersely.

"I won't be using this."

"I would hope not," Geralt says, "But--"

"No," Jaskier huffs. "I'm not using it, Geralt--"

Rolling his eyes, the Witcher steps farther into his space and presses their foreheads together ( not unlike a cat pressing it's head to your palm, he muses )-- and something he did fairly often now, an odd yet blatant show of affection that never failed to pull a smile from him.

"I will teach you," the Witcher says. It isn't a question, much to his dismay.

"Geralt," he sighs. "I have never and will never stab a man. Ever. In my life."

"Hmm." Geralt huffs a bit and straightens, leaves him standing there with the blade held flat in his palms as he turns to tend to Roach. "A lesser man will not show such restraint," he says.

"I've survived well over three decades without ever pulling a weapon," Jaskier points out, unsure of what else to do. It was a gift, after all-- the first of which Geralt had ever deigned him; he isn't about to just toss it.

"Yes," the Witcher concedes. "By luck."

"Rude," he says. "I think it's just my charm and diligence. I am a very capable man. Not to mention I have you."

"It's luck," maintains the Witcher. "A lot of luck. And you can't rely on me all the time."

"I don't!" Jaskier pouts. "I made it all the way to Toussaint without an incident. Almost. Without a _bad_ incident."

Geralt hums as he goes about undoing the saddle fixtures and relieving his mare, heedless of the bard's scrutiny ( or maybe ignoring it entirely ). "We can start small," he compromises. "Propper grip. Stance. Disarming. Nothing harmful."

"No," the bard groans, mournfully, even as he elects to plop himself down by the fire.

"I--"

"You'll what, Geralt? Force me to learn the art of stabbing?" Jaskier scoffs, inclining his head. "Or will you threaten to leave me behind at the next backwater tavern again?"

"No," the Witcher mutters. "But it would ease my mind. To know you are capable of defending yourself."

"Ah," the bard sighs to the flame. "Bollocks to you, my dear."

Geralt hums again, something beautifully akin to a laugh as he strokes his mare's snout. "It's the truth," he says, mirthfully.

And Jaskier believes him, more or less. Knows that he's oftentimes a liability, and that Geralt can do without the added guilt to his concious. That the man must care about him, in one sense or another, to have traveled as far south as he did for him.

He lowers his gaze to the blade pressed between his palms and sighs again.

"Just to disarm," Geralt tries again. "And if you find yourself willing, ways of defense that might hurt but not kill."

"Can't I just not leave your side, instead?"

"You do that anyways," the Witcher points out. "If I fall in battle, it will do you no good."

"Then I will sing my way out of it," Jaskier says, idly.

He can't see it, but between the silence and faint shuffling, he's certain Geralt rolls his eyes. "What will you sing? Fishmonger is certain to do you in."

"Fishmonger's Daughter will not, ever, be the last song I perform," Jaskier vows. "It'll be something with heart. Something substantial and moving--"

"A pie with filling," Geralt supplies.

"Your burial rites," he bites back, petulantly. "I'll sing your praises and then tell them you fuck toads. _All_ _of_ _my_ _pies_ are chock full of filling."

"Of course."

"Of course," he echoes, plainly. The bard turns the weapon in his grasp one last time before tucking it into his boot, then turns to study his companion as he tends to the coat of his mare.

"Why toads?" The Witcher asks.

He raises a brow. "Huh?"

"You said toads." Geralt takes pause, only to round Roach and begin again on the other side, partially obscured from his view. "Why toads?"

He settles his gaze on Roach instead, while her attention is stolen by the grass at her feet.

"Because witches like toads," he says, matter-of-factly, "and you like witches."

"I do not," comes the almost instantaneous reply.

Jaskier huffs. "Yeah, you do."

"I don't."

"You know," he calls, "you have a very funny way of showing that. Most people don't sleep with things that they don't like."

"Yennefer isn't a thing," chides his companion. "And I am not most people."

"Geralt," he deadpans. "You fucked her in a crumbling building. And then again on multiple occasions. You definitely--"

"It was the only thing she wanted," Geralt argues, mildly.

"Apologies," the bard blurts, unthinkingly. " _What?_ "

"Repayment for saving your life. She is a sorceress, you believe she works for free? 'A talk,' she said. 'Payment enough.'" With nearly abject horror, Jaskier watches him move back around to pet at his mare's snout. "I have lived long enough to know better."

"Are you forgetting the part where she threatened my life after?" He asks. "Or the part where you would have been hung because of her meddling?" To which Geralt shrugs, as if declaring ' _Bygones be bygones,_ ' and he gesticulates frantically. "All due respect, my dear, but you are absolutely mad! Delirious-- _bonkers._ "

"You would have let her die," Geralt remarks. 

"Yes!" The bard exclaims. "After everything she'd done to you, _yes,_ without hesitation-- and she would have done exactly the same, had she been where I was standing. _You--_ You are _incredible_ \-- and by incredible I mean _insane_ and very courageous, and I care for you with my whole heart. Had I known you'd gone in with that thinking I would've tried much harder to keep you back."

Geralt's neutral expression shifts-- two parts befuddled and one part amused ( or fond, or-- ). "She did not force me. I could have stopped, had I saw fit."

"Darling," he huffs, partially resigned, "that is entirely beside the point."

"Hmm."

"Fine."

"Fine?" Geralt muses, questioningly.

Jaskier frowns a bit and turns back toward the flame. "Fine," he says again, pulling his hands up to massage at his temples. "You can teach me your stabby tricks."

"I can?"

"Yes," he concedes, then resting his chin in his palm. Decidedly, he inclines his head. "I will use them to stab Yennefer myself."

The Witcher says nothing, so Jaskier turns again to look. He finds him looking remarkably confused, and quite a bit concerned, with his palm to the air where Roach noses at it.

"Yennefer," the Witcher says, carefully, "would squash you like a bug."

In lieu of his offense, Jaskier wrinkles his nose and turns back to the fire.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> geralt; what do you have??
> 
> jaskier, running at yen; a knife!!
> 
> geralt; nO


	53. Northern Wind, Send To Me My Sweetheart

Still northbound, a fortnight or so out from the bard's fair city of Oxenfurt, a pit settles unpleasantly in Geralt's stomach. Something he can't seem to quell despite his efforts.

Something suspiciously like apprehension-- or akin to despair.

He shakes his head lightly.

\--

"Adjustments have been made," Master Vesemir informs him.

Meekly, he grips the fabric of his tunic. "Adjustments?"

The elder Witcher grunts in affirmation. "It will be much like the Grasses." _It will hurt. We will rip you to pieces and sew you together again._ "You took well, the first time."

"I survived," Geralt breathes. He twists the coarse fabric in his fingers. "Not this time. I will die, Master."

"You did more than survive," Vesemir says, frowning. "Should you survive this--" _if, not when._ His life is a gamble. He remembers his brothers, writhing-- _begging, screaming_ \-- and the pain-- _white hot and searing--_ "You will be better off for it."

"I will die," Geralt says, again with nauseating certainty. Die as his brothers had, or worse-- he will live. "Or I will wish I had."

His mentor says nothing, though his frown deepens.

\--

Geralt tightens, and then loosens, and then once more tightens his grip on Roach's reins. She is steady beneath him, gait as comforting and familiar as the one trailing beside them both.

The bard plucks idly at his instrument, face tilted up toward the canopy over-stretching their path. A peculiar look settles across his features-- the one he always dons when piecing his works together; a far away look, the silent mouthing of words. He shakes his head a little, as if disquieted, and then his eyes widen a bit, and his lips part slightly, and--

Geralt realizes abruptly that he has been caught staring. He offers the slightest of smiles, though fears it comes across tersely, and turns his attention back to the path.

The bard, mercifully, says nothing but continues with his plucking. This time, it is a song-- obviously familiar to himself, but the Witcher finds that he can't place it.

Funny, seeing as he has decades on the man, that he knows ballads well before his time with easy familiarity.

"Ichot a bourde in boure bryht, that fully semly is on syht. Menskful maiden of myht; Feir ant fre to fonde--"

Geralt can tell a beast by its shit, cleave a man's head from his shoulders with the barest hint of effort.

Jaskier is made of and for far finer things.

"Blow northerne wynd! Send thou me my suetyng--" Geralt refrains from peering down, though his medallion hums gently against his chest. Instead he peers up, where the leaves rustle appreciatively, and then to the side where the foliage shivers in turn. "Blow northerne wynd! Blow, blow, blow."

Change precedes Jaskier-- or perhaps Jaskier precedes change; which, as unlikely as it sounds ( and unlikely as it must be ), makes the most sense. He wonders faintly if the bard knows that where he stands history bends ( the child, the witch, the mountain-- he leaves Kerack and Sodden crumbles in his wake ), that he can turn leaves with his voice-- and then he wonders if it is his voice at all, or an extension of the instrument itself. Maybe it's a mixture of both; the bard's conviction coupled with the lute's wiles.

Geralt shakes his head again. Vesemir would chide him for his absent thinking; it serves no purpose, and besides that-- Jaskier is only a bard. A mortal man-- though he supposes that is questionable as well. How should a man of more than forty winters look? The instrument keeps him young, but there is no telling whether it has granted longevity.

The thought unsettles him. They hadn't been apart long, after the mountain-- especially not to him; a year was a blink of an eye, really-- but if felt much longer. Something he was unaccustomed to. To lose the bard so soon after finding him ( or the bard found him, or they found each other )--

A scuff of a boot against stone. A sorry sort of twang breaking from the strings of his companion's instrument. Geralt is moving before he even turns to look-- clutching at fabric and enclosing it in his fist at the same time he slows his mare. She tosses her head, annoyed by his shifting. He pats her shoulder and at the same time pulls an indignantly squaking bard back onto his feet. There is no effort to the motion; he takes care not to jostle him as he is righted.

" _Do I weigh anything to you?_ " Jaskier questions, wonderously.

" _No._ "

The bard chuckles sheepishly, even as the collar of his doublet slips from his fingers, and blinks at him with wide eyes before his mouth stretches into a grin. "Thank you," he chirps.

He grunts, faintly amused, and nods once. Jaskier's grin widens, almost imperceptibly.

The pit falls as his hand returns to the reins, and evidently the bard notices-- because of course he does. The man reads him like an open book despite the calculated impassiveness.

"What ever is the matter, my--" _friend--_ "darling?" _Why? Darling, dear, Witcher._ When has a Witcher ever been darling? When has he ever been dear?

And why was he now, despite all his wrongdoings? Was this peacekeeping in the wake of an ongoing war? A means to an end?

Geralt never liked the cities. The stench, the noise. Oxenfurt, as Jaskier had said, was the closest he had to home. His lip twitches into the barest hint of a frown, and to his dismay the bard looks _sorry_ for it.

"Apologies," he says, grin slipping. "Have I done something?"

"No," he dissuades, quickly. "No. Nothing. Do not apologize."

Jaskier looks halfway between concerned and amused, furrowing his brows some. "Is something bothering you, then? You can--"

"Oxenfurt."

It surprises him as much as it must surprise Jaksier, the sudden and open disclosure. He swallows, then shakes his head.

"What of Oxenfurt?" The bard inquires, lifting a brow. "There will be no need to settle for an inn, as I hold quarters within the academy-- and you will be granted your own, of course. I know the city is less than ideal--"

"No," he blurts. "I meant-- Yes. But--"

He sighs, and Jaskier remains quietly attentive as he tries to piece together his words. Oftentimes, the bard understood him anyways. This was different-- conflicting-- and not something easily conveyed in his usual manner.

"I don't know," he finishes, lamely.

Jaskier lilts his head a little-- a small smile tilting his lips. 

"Quite alright," the bard says, earnestly. "I will still be here when you figure it out."

"What if--" He pauses and swallows, then deigns it best to turn his attention back to the path with a grimace. "Hmm."

The bard shifts. He hears it, rather than see it, just as he hears the soft huff that passes his lips or Roach's dramatic exhale as he coaxes her back into motion.

"Geralt--"

Again, he moves first before thinking-- twists in the saddle to catch the bard in his sights as he stops her ( _again,_ much to her chargin ).

Jaskier's expression is somewhere between pleading, reluctant and resigned when he parts his lips.

"I was wondering," he says. "There's a village, not too far up-- I thought-- well, I wanted to ask, if, you know--" Geralt watches him flush, as if he's come to realize his lack of coherencey. "Could we? Um. Go that way? A quick stop, is all-- It's-- well, there isn't much to it, really. Small village, but--"

"Yes."

"Yes?" The bard echoes, bewildered. 

"If you want to," Geralt affirms. "Yes."

"I thought," he begins, then wrinkles his nose. "Nevermind," he says. "Thank you. I-- its been... well, I haven't been since before we met."

"Before we met," he muses.

"Yes," the bard chuckles, weakly, as he makes to return to his side. "I was... well, not doing too great, actually."

"You have friends there?"

"I do," Jaskier affirms. "Though I fear, um... Well, it was quite some time ago. Ah, best not dwell on it as such. Maybe-- maybe I'll be surprised. I'd like you to meet them, in any case. They'll like you. Very good people."

Geralt nods, somewhat-- more so lost in the fact that this is more than a trip down memory lane for the bard. That he wants to introduce _him_ to people he _knows._ Which is a stupid thought, really, to think that Jaskier would be reluctant to be seen with him by someone he knows, seeing as the man parrots and goads about him wherever he goes.

"I'm sure they are," he says, finally.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> surprise in the next chapter, as requested of me quite a while back
> 
> song is "blow, northerne wynd"


	54. Geralt and the Incessant Bard

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> its been a while, huh? this one's a little shorter than the last one, but hey- getting back into the swing of things, i suppose

Blackwater.

' _Not much_ ,' in Geralt's opinion, was a severe understatement. It was more of a settlement than a village-- two dozen, maybe three, houses cluttered in haphazard rings around a single well. The inn, at least, he was reassured to be a suitable size.

" _Don't let the name fool you,_ " the bard had said. " _Clearer water I've never seen in my life. Nor better folk._ "

Jaskier, to put it lightly, was elated-- determined not to let the sway of time dreg his heart through the mud as he bounded past the first ring of houses. Or attempted to bound, anyways-- as much as he could while clutching Ettariel to his chest with one hand and Geralt's wrist in the other, and Geralt wasn't doing too much, honestly, to speed things along. Nor was Roach, who was walking at practically a snail's pace.

Despite this, there was no deterring him-- and no need to deter him to begin with, as from his peripheral he could see someone running straight for him.

So, as per course, Geralt's body is moving before he directs it to. A movement that sets him in front and might've knocked the bard flat on his ass if not for the fact that he'd had a solid grip on him.

"Geralt," he sputters, clapping a hand onto his shoulder. He pays the man no mind, if only because the stranger is slowing a few paces off.

"Jaskier!" She calls, excitedly.

"Bran!" Exclaims the bard, lurching forward with a grin that swiftly turns to a frown. He palms at Geralt's hand in an attempt to remove it. "Bran?"

Reluctantly, he obliges. It's obvious that they're acquainted, though he can't place the rather pinched expression upon Jaskier's face. Oddly enough, he doesn't move.

"You've hardly changed at all," he says, wonderously.

A grin nearly splits the woman's face in two. "You haven't changed," she says, "not even a bit. Must say, I wondered."

Geralt looks between the two and shifts-- which seems to jostle Jaskier out of whatever reprieve he's fallen into. The bard reclaims his wrist and turns.

"This is Bran," he says. "She was the barmaiden, last I was here." _Some years back, before we met._ "And Bran," he turns again, "this is--"

"Geralt of Rivia," she finishes, with a genuine smile that nearly catches him off guard. "We've heard the ballads-- what other Witcher would you be passing through with, silly bard? You'll have to play for us, word of mouth can do nothing for the real thing."

The grin Jaskier throws him-- ' _You hear that, Geralt?'--_ does little to settle the thin veil of unease that shrouds him-- _"Bran? You've hardly changed at_ _all-_ -" but he offers Bran a nod regardless. The bard pats his arm, then squeezes it once, reassuringly, as if he might need such a thing, and, much to his dismay, breaks off from his side to run into her open arms.

\--

A dog noses at his palm-- his first thought is that its eyes are as blue as its former master's-- and he runs his fingers through its silky coat. Jaskier throws him a lopsided grin, bright enough to rival the dying sun, that makes his stomach do something funny. He elects to ignore it.

Blackwater is cursed-- or blessed, as its inhabitants claim. He doesn't really believe in blessings ( but maybe he should, by now ). The bard hasn't stopped smiling in eons ( although that isn't exactly a new development, he should be worried if he wasn't ) and it's a wonder he hasn't split in two.

Sara's babe is not a babe, much to his companion's disappointment ( but what was he expecting, twenty years down the line? ). The young man is about the age the he was when they first met in Posada, only a smidge taller and a fair bit more sturdy in build ( still nothing compared to himself, but certainly not small ). Jaskier takes it as a sort of personal attack ( _"Could've waited, my_ _lad!_ " ), to which the young man snorts.

There seems to be an unspoken dynamic underlining their familiarity. Geralt isn't exactly uncomfortable, but he is certainly out of his element. Jaskier talks to these people the same way he talks to everyone else, except there is unabashed fondness dripping with every word, and his smile widens just a little bit every time he spares a glance this way, and Geralt realizes rather suddenly that he's never met one of Jaskier's acquaintances before. He'd never even been bothered to ask after them. Never even gave it a thought.

"Tell me, Master Witcher--" Sara, Blackwater's inkeep, is a frazzled old woman. Not as old as he'd expect by her appearance, but certainly much older. Her mouth curves into an easy smile that rattles his nerves as much as it means to settle them. "What is it like? Wandering the Path?"

\--

"Jaskier," she huffs, wrinkling her nose. "Like the weed?"

His smile doesn't waver, though he does shrivel up a little on the inside. "No," he corrects mildly. "Like buttercups. The little yellow flowers."

With a pensive lilt of her head, she parts her lips, then presses them firmly shut, and then opens them again.

"Buttercups are poisonous, you know," she tells him. "At least you can eat dandelions." Her hand lifts to rub at her nose as she sniffs. "You don't look much at all like a buttercup. Your eyes are blue, like cornflowers."

"Cornflower the Bard doesn't ring so nicely, however, does it?" He inquires.

The girl hums and pauses to tuck a strand of ashen hair behind her ear as she considers this. He takes the moment to prop his lute against his knee and fiddle with her keys-- not that she needs it.

After a breath, his charge continues.

"No," she concedes. "It doesn't."

\--

They're offered separate rooms, free of charge. For some reason, Geralt feels inclined to snap. He must look it, or otherwise his companion is telepathic, because a hand settles atop his forearm.

"Quite alright," Jaskier assuages, eyes bright. Geralt turns his gaze to the bowl of stew settled on the table in front of it and shoves a heaping spoonful into his mouth. "One is enough. We wouldn't want to hold you up-- and besides that, it's best I'm close at hand. This oaf can hardly piss without my help."

Sara laughs something full and hardy, hands on her stomach as if she fears her insides might otherwise spill out. He blinks, once. Twice. Doesn't dignify the bard with a retort, nor a glance.

"Oh," he sighs, lightly. "Don't get all dreary on me, my dear."

"I said nothing."

"Your pout," the bard teases, "says more than enough."

He huffs between spoonfulls.

"I do not pout."

"You do."

"I do not."

"Whatever you say," his companion agrees placatingly, turning his attention instead to his meal.

For the better, he thinks, because pouting Witchers most definitely did not exist. He shoves another spoonful into his mouth, content to let the not-quite-silence ( or ambiance, as the bard might say ) settle over them as the patrons chatter amongst themselves. Peering through his lashes, he watches as Sara smiles-- something warm and fond and almost sickeningly sweet-- before reaching across the table to tug at a strand of Jaskier's hair. Something in her gaze is strikingly familiar, and yet he cannot place it.

\--

"Look," he grins, holding out a fistful of colorful herbs. "I found these," he huffs, proudly. "The ones like you use-- some of them."

She crouches to his height and takes them gently, as if they were delicate enough to break beneath the pressure of her fingertips, before leaning forward to press a kiss to his palm.

"Thank you, Geralt."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope you've enjoyed yourself thus far! always happy to see your comments!


	55. Geralt and the Hypothetical Wishes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> longer than last time? yessir, i'm getting back into the groove.
> 
> enjoy some wibbly, wobbly, timeline stew.

"I haven't changed," the bard murmurs to his reflection that evening. "Have I?"

Geralt isn't quite sure whether he's being spoken to, but he inclines his head as he stretches his legs in front of his seat by the fireplace-- one part amused and one part concerned as he watches the man tap at the side of his nose, as if he's worried it might start flowing. It's familiar, in a worrying sense. He has a habit of getting lost in his reflection ( and had he not known better, he might have-- or, rather, he _had_ \-- thought it narcissism ); or rather, getting lost within himself in general.

It isn't like it's news to either of them that he's retained his youthfulness; the cause of it leans back with her head against his thigh.

"I'm not sure," he murmurs, and the gaze of Jaskier's reflection flickers over to him. "I think you might be graying at the temples."

The bard offers him a flat look, which quickly schools into indifference before melting into a vague sort of worry ( despite the improbability of it ) before he refocuses on himself. He brings up a hand to tug at his hair, as if in reassurance, then parts his lips.

"I most definitely am _not._ " He says, firmly. Then he furrows his brows. "You're projecting, Geralt. You're the old man, here."

"I am not."

"Not projecting," the bard questions, "or not old?"

"The former," he says, crossing his arms and turning back to the flames, because there's no use arguing the truth of the latter. Especially when they both know he's lived partway through two lifetimes by now.

"You are, but at least you have the sense not to argue something so blatantly obvious."

Geralt tilts his head back, taking in the cracked and splintered ceiling less because of interest and more because his eyes can't help it. Somewhere around the eighth crevice he thinks about tugging his chair closer to the fire, then tunes into its crackling and the accompanying pop of the logs. There's a clinking-- almost metallic, but likely glass. He can picture the bard at the basin, tilting and repositioning his perfumes, dipping his fingers in creams that he doesn't actually need anymore but rubbing them into his skin anyway.

"Do you wish to change?" He asks.

He listens as water sloshes into the basin, and to the faint scraping of an unscrewing lid that follows it. Jaskier takes his time lathering the substance ( he sniffs, once, out of habit, and determines it's the foam he uses for shaving ) between his hands before applying it to his face.

"What do you mean?" The bard questions, mildly. "There are many ways a man can change. I'd hardly need to wish."

Geralt hums. Sometimes it isn't easy to tell whether the bard is evading or just feeling generally contemplative. He can't recall a time he tried to learn the difference-- nor the instance he realized he cared enough to want to. Jaskier cleans off his hands in the still water before continuing his ministrations.

A moment of reprieve follows, where he listens to the scrape of blade against skin.

"You don't want to go gray," he says, "but you sound disappointed by staying the same."

"Are you doing the weird thing where you listen to my heart when I talk?" The bard questions.

"No."

"Why not?"

"Because you're honest," Geralt says. "And if you aren't, there is a reason not to be."

With a flick of the blade, Jaskier continues. "I don't mind being young. Do you?"

"I'm not young," he reminds him.

"Well," the man says. "Not _as_ young, no. Though I reckon if you bothered to shave, you'd be about where I should be. Maybe even a tad younger."

"Generous," Geralt quips, "though I didn't ask if you minded being young."

"Hmm."

"If you had a djinn," he tries again, "what would you wish for?"

"Three wishes, right?"

"Yes."

A clink follows, presumably Jaskier setting the blade down, even though he isn't finished. Listening closely, slipping his eyes shut, Geralt pictures him threading his fingers together and settling them in his lap.

"My first wish," he begins, calmly, "you already know. I wish for Valdo Marx to drop dead in a piss drenched back alley somewhere very far away from me."

Geralt can't help the borderline incredulous huff that passes his lips-- and Jaskier must have heard it, because he chuckles.

"Trust me, the whole of The Continent would be far better off without him." He shifts in his seat, the heel of his boot clicks against the floor as he leans back. "My second wish-- well, my first was rather selfish. Perhaps I should wish peace upon mankind, or end famine for good-- but maybe that's too much to ask, even of a djinny-djinn-gin-- oh! What about safe passage for the elves of Lower Posada? Safe passage, wherever they went."

"My third wish-- well, this _is_ a hypothetical, isn't it? I'm not actually making any wishes, so it wouldn't actually _matter_ whether my wishes were selfish, but... I don't. Won't, rather. What do I need three wishes to myself for?"

Jaskier's chair creaks as he digs his heels into the floor and pushes back. Geralt hears the blade faintly clatter as he plucks it from beside the basin, and turns to look as he continues his ministrations.

"You asked if I wanted to change," the bard says. His hair flops as he inclines his head, and the blade gives a faint _swoosh_ as it swiftly drags across his face. "I suppose that's what the third wish would be for, had I kept it to myself-- but that begs the question _who would I rather be?_ Changing any little thing would bring me farther from myself than I ever have been, wouldn't it? And I'd never know where I could have ended up as myself, otherwise. And-- well, I'm sure you didn't ask at the thought of a lecture, so my answer is no. I wouldn't _like_ to change, as much as I sometimes wish it. Maybe, had I been younger-- because I might _look_ young, but I am not-- I might've had a different answer. Now, it feels too much like giving up. Not to mention all I might've lost."

Geralt remains silent-- he isn't sure what he had been expecting when he asked, but the bard's answer had answered more than he'd bargained for ( while at the same time dredging up many more questions; but to talk as he was now was not something he normally did, so he decides to keep them to himself ). Jaskier's reflection meets his eyes, and he pauses his ministrations to fall into an easy grin that crinkles his eyes before moving again to finish up.

"So, Geralt," he says. "Three wishes."

He blinks.

"I would give them to you," he decides, after a beat. "I'm terrible at wishes."

The bard furrows his brows, then does his best to bite back a smile. It doesn't work, of course; he ends up ducking his head, cradling it in his hand, blade tossed aside and shoulders shaking as he laughs.

\--

It tastes like bile. _Worse_ than bile-- and what's more, one of his men coughs it back up almost as soon as it goes down. That is a problem for a few reasons.

Firstly, the man will most certainly die, and while they hardly knew each other he will probably have nightmares brought on by his choking and convulsions. Secondly, they will not be able to retrieve the body, as they are short on time. Thirdly, it means extra lugging about ( and while he is not above it, he would rather have hurried along ).

It is not the first time he has seen someone die, but this time it is mostly his fault-- something he will certainly dwell on later. A hand settles atop his shoulder and he tugs away.

"Thank you."

"We have to go."

"Yes."

The ground quakes beneath his feet. His muscles strain under the weight of barrels and chests. They pass their acquaintance's corpse, propped up against the sewer wall, on the way out.

"We did it," she breathes.

In part, yes. They've got what they came _here_ for, but getting what they _want_ is another matter entirely. He wipes the sweat from his brow with the back of his hand.

"Not quite, my dear."

"A near thing," she amends, taking hold of his arm.

"Yes," he finds himself agreeing. The boat teeters beneath his feet. "A near thing."

\--

He left Ettariel at the Rosemary and Thyme-- not that he would be allowed her company, anyhow. Not in a place like this. Rather, he's certain she would have been burned, or smashed, or perhaps, if neither were possible, thrown into the water to settle at its bed. He closes his eyes and the ghost of a light bursts beneath his lids; he presses his forehead against the cold stone and draws his knees up to his chest. His fingers twitch and something _other_ tugs at his chest, like a rope wrapped in his fist. He has a feeling destiny is unfurling herself from her slumber, and soon his eyes will open to it.

A baton clacks at the bars of a cell to his left. With a quirk of his lips, he begins to hum.

\--

"Jaskier," the Witcher hums.

The bard inclines his head and flashes a grin that he prays does not come off as ruefull as it feels. He's been made well aware of the situation before him ( and even if he wasn't, he could see it in the wary set of the man's gaze ), and he's prepared as best he can given the circumstances.

"I'm told we were friends," he begins. He sounds skeptical. This does not surprise him.

"We are friends," he amends, carefully. "Best friends, actually-- and _yes_ , yes, I know. Witchers do _not_ have best friends. They have comerades, acquaintances, brothers in arms. We had that talk quite a long time ago, and you have long since changed your mind."

"Hmm."

Jaskier huffs something bordering a laugh, one that squeezes his heart painfully. It's difficult to take his eyes off him, what with him tensed like he might spring up and stab him in the side, but he manages and reaches out for his mead.

"Sit, Geralt," he says. "Have a drink, or two, or ten. I can see you thinking, I suppose we have much to discuss. It's good you found me-- I'm glad to see you, even if it isn't quite mutual. I worried for you, despite reassurances, its been a while."

Maybe it's something in his voice, or his eyes, or his ease of posture-- or maybe Geralt can hear the cracking of his heart. He watches the Witcher's gaze flit about the room, then settle back on his face long enough to determine that at the very least he's harmless enough to indulge in a drink or two with, and takes the seat opposite.

\--

Geralt watches the bard pat his face dry with a towelette and appraise himself in the mirror before turning ( watches his hand as it slips mindfully downward to cradle the neck of his instrument, in order not to send it clambering to the floor ).

"With my newly acquired wishes," he says, "and that would be two, because you must have wished me the rest with your first-- I would wish that my inkwell never run out of ink, and that your coin purse always be full when you need it. And I suppose, with my own final wish, because I had saved it for someone else, I would make it so that your blades never dull."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> jaskier; hypothetically, i would use one of the wishes you gave me, and the last of my own, to make your life a little easier :D
> 
> geralt; hhh, fu c k-- what does,,, what does that mean,,,


	56. The Witcher and The Wine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi its been a while  
> does my formatting keep changing? yeah a lil bit, my bad.  
> i'm too lazy to go back and make it all look nice though haha

"Take this-"

"No."

"Eh- pardon? No?"

Geralt doesn't roll his eyes, though admittedly it is a near thing. He turns his nose to the air- grip slackened against Roach's reins- not that he really needs to. The woods on either side of them are decidedly quiet; the easy kind, one that still harbors birdsong and the occasional skitter of an animal under brush. He isn't foolish enough to let his guard down, but he is begrudgingly at ease.

"Geralt."

Almost.

"Geraaaaalt!"

Closing his eyes, he inhales.

"Oi! Don't go and ignore me!"

"Bard-"

"Oho! ' _Bard_ ,' now is it? And here I thought-"

"Jaskier," he amends with a grimace.

"You do know that you wanted me here, yes?"

He sighs. " _Jaskier_."

"Geralt."

"Bard Jaskier."

"Geralt of Rivia!"

Geralt opens his eyes. He doesn't smile, though he finds himself dipping his head to catch his companion's amusedly aghast expression. "Master Bard."

Placing his hand just above his breast, the bard smiles somewhat placatingly.

"My dear white wolf," he says, achingly sweet. "As wonderful as it is that you have acquired a sense of humor in this cheery forest-"

"Fine."

"Thank you!" Jaskier chirps brightly, detangling himself with a bit of effort and tossing his satchel up.

He catches it easily- doesn't bother to slow when he can slip it on himself. The bard only appraises him once before turning back to the path, satisfied with himself and humming in tandem to the spring in his step.

"I do know." However, he isn't so sure why he admits it.

His companion doesn't turn to look up at him, but he does smile in a rather self-satisfied manner.

"I know," he says, simply. "Lovely weather this morning, is it not?"

Geralt hums noncommittally.

It is.

* * *

Fate is a fickle thing. Tucking the girl's face into the crook of his neck, burying his face in her ashen hair, he sighs.

"You won't leave me?"

"No."

What a foolish promise to make ( especially one that felt like he was doomed to make forever). He was full of those.

* * *

He takes it back. He does not know why he'd want someone so- so frivolous, so childish, so loud and so-

"Geralt!" The bard calls for the umpteenth time. "Look at this! What do you think?"

Peering over the ridiculous man's shoulder, Geralt blinks dumbly at the object in his palm. "It is a pen."

Even the market stall itself, in this modest village, was nothing spectacular to look at. There was no magic, no stolen goods, no monster parts- only folded squares of fabric and gaudy trinkets masquerading as something valuable.

"Well," Jaskier says, lilting his head back. "Yes, I knew that much." With an amused sigh, he lifts it higher. "But do you think it is a nice one?"

While the decorum isn't lost on him, he's almost positive that it would work about as well as any other. That, and- "The silver is not silver."

The bard raises his brows. "It isn't? What keen eyes you-"

"Oi."

All at once, the charming air slips from the bard's shoulders. His posture shifts, while not displeasurable, distinctly strained; he twirls the pen once in his hand before thunking it solidly back onto the market stall. "Thank you, but-"

"Wouldn't sell to no fairy-lad like yourself, anyhow," the stall owner sorts.

"The bard is not fae," Geralt deadpans.

The man blinks up at him, almost as if seeing him for the first time.

"Actually, I'm half fairy-!" The bard interjects, proudly.

He frowns. "No you aren't."

"Not in that way, dearest!"

"Hm."

"Leave now!"

"You," the bard exclaims, jabbing a finger at the stall owner, even as Geralt drags him off by the collar, "have _terrible_ customer service!"

* * *

"How much farther?"

"Ask again, I'm sure in the next two minutes we will have made some great distance-"

"Oho," Jaskier goads. "What a foul mood!"

"I-" Geralt sighs. "Mm."

"Oh, no! Do keep going! It's so rare to-"

"Jaskier," he says. "Are you not a traveling bard?"

"I am," he relents wearily.

"And are you not a scholar?"

"Geralt-"

"Yet you cannot tell the distance between one destination to another."

"Sorry old bastard," the bard mutters. "You've likely seen every tree on the continent and memorized your way by the nooks in the bark."

"Mm," Geralt affirms. "A manticore died by my blade on this very path."

His companion blinks up at him, eyes alight. "Did it really?"

"No. It's the scent," he informs, disdainfully. "The stronger the smell of piss and scat, the closer I am to civilization."

"Your humor could use work," blanches the bard. "Though this once, I fear you are being truthful."

"Hm."

"Oh, don't be like that." He reaches up to pat Geralt's knee. "I know you're always truthful. To me. Within reason, of course. That's just the type of man you are."

Geralt blinks at the bard's hand, lips pursed, and urges his mare a bit faster. The man's hand retracts with a scoff. Instead, he fiddles with the strap of his lute case.

"So," he says. "We'll arrive at Carmine sometime past noon tomorrow, yes? Because as likely you are to increase our pace over time, my feet will-"

"I knew it," Geralt huffs, almost petulantly.

"Well what else am I supposed to do?"

"Be quiet," he offers. Even without the bard's answering snort, he knows that isn't an option.

His companion rolls his shoulders and parts his lips to sing of some heroine who slays some scaly beast, unaccompanied by the instrument across his back. Corrections roll mindlessly to the tip of his tongue, as they always do, but he swallows them back down again and continues to face forward.

* * *

Geralt hates the city. Everything about it. The sounds, the people, the smells- the only good thing to come out of it is quite possibly the food, though even then it's rare he'd indulge himself when he could save coin for more important things.

The bard is all about indulgence- "You only live once!" Being his backward reasoning, and not something he cares to oblige on the brink of his own second lifetime. He supposed once that it had something to do with nobility- once you have a taste of luxury it never leaves your tongue; but Julian Alfred Pankratz, Viscount de Lettenhove ( and doesn't that sit like cotton in his mouth )- Jaskier- is not like other noblemen. He is 'his own man' first and foremost; he is a bard. He is a master of the seven arts. He is frivolous and he is ridiculous, he boasts his title one second and is privately disdainful of it in the next.

The city of Oxenfurt is both his companion's greatest indulgence and most severe heartache. It isn't the first time they've been here together, but it is the first time he's noticed. It's in the set of the man's shoulders, and a grin so widely stretched it must ache. Geralt does his best to stick names to the faces he is introduced to, an effort he doesn't make so easily for most ( but he feels compelled now, as if his eyes have been opened again for the first time since the trials, and this time he is reluctant to close them again ). He imagines that every hand the bard releases feels like a torn thread ( "The academy misses you." "Oh, you flatter me as always!" ), but in his unwelcome opinion he thinks that it is better to cut the thread early so that it can't snag onto something later.

Geralt watches Jaskier laugh brightly into his wine and lean away from his side onto the arm of a woman he can't name. Somewhat disdainfully, he has a sudden and distinct feeling that he is intrinsically tangled in a thread of his own. He might have noticed this sooner, before he left what little comfort the lodges of Kaer Morhen brought on this ass backward quest to bring the man home with him- before he spent some decades on and off beside him- because this whole thing is an indulgence. It is selfish. Witchers are not meant to indulge, or be selfish. He might've noticed sooner, but he hadn't.

With an out of place sigh, he lifts his own drink and downs it swiftly. He expects to be told off by the looks thrown his way, but this odd bundle of scholars only quirk their lips in a private smile. Jaskier laughs again and lifts his own drink to copy him, but by this point Geralt knows the man's limits better than he does. It's something like reflex that has him reaching out to snag his drink away. After a moment's thought, he downs this one too.

"Geralt!" The man cries with a pout.

"Hm."

It took them a while to get here. Back here. Past what they used to have, to where they sit now. He mulls over this as he watches the man goad over him like his acquired company is some secret prize. Before, he had said he was reluctant to indulge the man; now he picks at his platter and counts in his head how many stops it was that they took along the way.

Maybe the bard is more of an infection than a thread. Geralt had gotten wounded somewhere along the way and Jaskier had wormed himself inside. This fever refuses to break. Everyone indulges him, it's practically second nature- while Geralt is unnatural, he is not immune to any force of nature.

He glares at the woman Jaskier was leaning against and she stills both her hand and tongue before offering the man more drink.

"We should go," he says.

"Should we?" The bard questions with a raised brow. His lips purse thoughtfully. "I suppose so. How long will we stay?"

Geralt hums. Then blinks. "We could spare a few nights," he decides.

"Can we?"

Not really. They weren't making awfully good time. "Yes."

The bard smiles sweetly. "We'll leave the day after tomorrow, then. Have a lazy day, hm? Bit of rest will do us good."

He blinks again. "I said-"

"Yes, my dear," the man interjects, wagging an uncoordinated finger. "I heard. We'll speak more of it privately, if-you-so-wish."

"Have you elsewhere to be?" The unnamed woman asks.

Geralt knows better than to assume she is speaking to him, so he makes no effort to reply. Instead, he reaches to snag some bread off the platter before him and tear into it with his teeth.

Jaskier huffs, amused, and turns back. Swaying slightly, he nods. "'Fraid so. You know how it is. Adventures and the like to be had."

"So close to winter?"

"Ah- yes. We'll be visiting folk very dear to us for the season."

"Dear to the Witcher?" Another man snorts. "They haven't anyone-" his gaze flits. "No offense."

Geralt shrugs.

"What?" The bard deadpans. "I'm right here, you know."

"Eh?"

"Geralt has _me_ , for one," Jaskier points out with the self importance of a king. "We're best friends, in fact. Isn't that right, Geralt?"

"This is a trap," he elects to say.

His companion turns on him, face lightly flushed and brows raised. "Is it now? Might I tell them who trapezed down the whole of the continent-"

Geralt coughs and places his bread aside, though despite his words he admits rather easily, "The bard is my friend."

"Thank you."

"Unfortunately," he tacks on, for spite.

"Oh- don't you dare start-"

"Aren't we a tad old for 'Best friends?'" Inputs another scholar, unhelpfully. Geralt doesn't deign to look at him, instead sighing and reaching for his food once more.

"Old?" The bard beside him sputters, indignantly. "I'm hardly a day past twenty-four-"

"That's cock- er-" The man coughs into his wrist. "We went to school together you brat! You might still look a child with your fancy glamours and such, but we're well awa-"

"I do not look like a child, nor I do use a glamor! I simply do well to-"

"You're well old enough to be a father!"

"How _dare_ you-"

"He's right," inputs the woman, nodding politely.

"No!" Jaskier grumbles. "I'm youthful still. Can we put out this conversation?"

* * *

"You said you wouldn't leave," she huffs.

Vesimir scoffs beside her, lowing a heavy hand onto her scrawny shoulder. Something heady like guilt pools at Geralt's feet. His grip tightens on his mare's reins.

"He'll be back," the old man says. "You have training to do."

He purses his lips. "If- ... I will return by winter. You will not be idle without me."

"But-"

"They are trusted," he instills.

"I know! But-"

"I expect improvement," he says, sternly. "Perhaps when I return, if Vesimir deems you worthy enough, I will clash swords with you."

The young girl's face twists with displeasure, but eventually falls into resignation. "Give me your word."

"You have it."

"Then go," she says, nodding once. Her arms raise to fold across her chest. "Do what you must."


End file.
